Award-Winning Broadway Producer Jhett Tolentino Shares His Life in Autobiography Film “Life is What You Make It”
Three (3)-time Tony and Grammy Award winning Broadway producer Mr. Jhett Tolentino poses before the photo-booth prepared by the Consulate for the special screening of his autobiographic film entitled “Life is What You Make It.”
19 October 2017 TORONTO – On October 12, the Philippine Consulate General in Toronto held a special screening of the film “Life is What You Make It,” an autobiography written, directed and produced by three (3)-time Tony and Grammy Award winning Broadway producer Mr. Jhett Tolentino.
The 35-minute film told the awe-inspiring story of Mr. Tolentino from being an impoverished young boy from Brgy. Calumpang, Molo, Iloilo City to become a three-time Tony Award and Grammy Award winning Broadway producer in New York. He grew up in a household with no running water but went on to finish high school and college through a scholarship grant from a Japanese foundation called Meguko Society, a charitable student organization at the Jesuit-run Sophia University in Tokyo, which raises scholarship funds for indigenous children in India and the Philippines.
The film also talked about Mr. Tolentino’s advocacy for education. He said “One must get an education, no matter what. It doesn’t matter what course you take as long as you get a diploma. If you have a diploma, you distinguish yourself from the rest.”
After completing elementary school, he was told by his parents to stop schooling and wait for his other siblings to finish school, with the understanding that his siblings will then send him to school once they graduate. Unperturbed and confident in his own abilities, he searched for a scholarship and was fortunate to have been granted one promoted by the Our Lady of the Miraculous Medal Parish, which was funded by the Meguko Society. After high school, the foundation agreed to continue funding his college education. Through his unbridled persistence and sheer determination, Mr. Tolentino was able to finish an accounting degree at the University of Iloilo. “Don’t be afraid to ask questions. If you don’t ask, you’ll never know the answer,” He added.
During the Q & A, he shared how he found himself in the field of Broadway. He traveled to the United States to work in 2002 and had to work six jobs at one point ranging from being a clerk, waiter, nanny, and caregiver. One day, he found himself watching Broadway, from three times a week to five times a week, and started a blog. Soon enough he was being invited to opening nights, rehearsals and castings and then he met insiders and key industry people and the rest, as they say, is history, he explained.
He now plans to pay it forward by establishing a scholarship foundation that will fund scholarships for poor and needy students in the Philippines, starting in his home province of Iloilo. END
For more information, visit www.torontopcg.dfa.gov.ph / www.philcongen-toronto.com or https://www.facebook.com/PHinToronto.
Mr. Jhett Tolentino briefly introduces his autobiographic film entitled “Life is What You Make It” before a jampacked audience at the Philippine Consulate General in Toronto on October 12.
