Jack E. Jett
Encyclopedia
Jack E. Jett is the first openly gay
American talk show host.
and moved to Los Angeles
at the age of 21. He held various jobs in the entertainment industry while in Los Angeles; among them, he was the Talent Agency Representative for the American Federation of Television and Radio Artists
(AFTRA). He then went through the Creative Artist training program.
Through a fluke meeting at The China Club in the early 1980s, Mr. Jett was offered a contract to model for Cinq Deux Un ("521"), an agency in Tokyo
, Japan
. Jett's modeling career lasted for the next eight years. Then known as "Jhett," he became one of the highest paid male models in the world in 1982, with contracts in Milan
, Paris
, Los Angeles, and Barcelona
. Jett also appeared in Playgirl
that year, in a profile about his career and life in Beverly Hills
. He met The Go-Go's
lead singer Belinda Carlisle
, and they quickly became best friends.
Upon retiring, or being retired from, modeling, Jett began to travel with The Go-Go's, handling various tasks such as press, travel, interview schedules, and luggage handling. During Carlisle's solo career, he worked as her personal assistant.
In 1988, Jett dropped the name Jhett.
, an Australian broadcast network. He worked as a liaison between the American production companies and the network's executives. Prime was an aggregator
of television programming, supplying programming for local stations. Jett developed projects for these stations to produce, in addition to finding new programs from the United States for them to broadcast.
After a few years he grew tired of the long distance travel, and wanted to stay near his home in West Hollywood, California
. He accepted a position as a coordinator for the CBS Television City
comedy casting department. This position allowed him to find up-and-coming comedy talent in various Equity
-waiver theatres and comedy clubs, and arrange meetings between those comedians and various casting executives.
By the time he was 40, Jett had lost 40 friends to the AIDS
epidemic. He began volunteer work with the charitable organizations Aid For AIDS
, Elizabeth Taylor
’s amfAR
, and Cable Positive
.
cable TV in Los Angeles, Jett found a very limited public-access television selection in Dallas. He decided to create a show that featured various oddball characters and freaks of nature. The show became a local cult classic, and soon became available on cable access stations in New York, Los Angeles, San Francisco, Houston, and Austin.
PrideVision Television in Canada (later renamed OUTtv
) offered Jett the chance to move from public-access television to national cable television. He co-produced 65 episodes of The Jack E. Jett Show with Chris Rentzel; that show later became one of the first programs on the Q Television Network
, the first American television network catering to the LGBT
community.
conversations, and email
s. Over 150 episodes were produced. The show was seen five nights a week, and catered exclusively to the gay and lesbian community.
, Kim Coles
, Butch Patrick
(The Munsters), and Randy Jones (The Village People).
Jett's regular co-hostess was Jackie Enx. Enx is a transsexual
radio personality, who hosted a segment called "Fun with Hypocrisy." Jackie was formerly known as Liam Jason, the drummer for the rock band Rhino Bucket
.
A featured co-host was the internationally-famous Sandra Bernhard
. Jett and Bernhard hit it off right away, and she signed on to become a regular part of The Queer Edge. The Queer Edge with Jack E. Jett and Sandra Bernhard ran for another 40 episodes, until Q Television folded.
When Q Television began to falter, a new management team was sent in, but the network was never able to recover. As a result, Jett ended up with total ownership of the 145 episodes of The Queer Edge. Those episodes can now be seen in Canada, New Zealand, Australia, Belgium, Luxembourg, and The Netherlands. The shows can also be seen on TLA Video On Demand, as well as Jett’s own online channel, FUTV in JetTVision, operated in conjunction with World of Wonder.
The Queer Edge with Jack E. Jett and Sandra Bernhard was one of the first chat shows picked up by ManiaTV!
.
Jett has been involved with Ring My Bell for World of Wonder TV. He has been a substitute host host for Cheaters
, and hosted a new pilot for Bobby Goldstein Productions, Love Sick.
The Dallas Observer stated that Jett was to host a new program on Dallas radio station KFXR-AM "CNN 1190"
starting on January 25, 2010. In the newspaper's blog posting announcing the show, Jett was quoted as saying The next day, station producer J.D. Freeman announced that the show had been cancelled, saying "The guy shows bad judgement, and I wouldn't put him on the air. Any personality who uses that language is not someone we want on the air."
As of May 2010, Jett was co-hosting a show with Rob Lobster on Dallas-area AM station KFCD
called ilume-A-Nation Radio, featuring what Jett called "guilty pleasure yourself songs," once-popular songs now widely disliked.
ging style.
Homosexuality
Homosexuality is romantic or sexual attraction or behavior between members of the same sex or gender. As a sexual orientation, homosexuality refers to "an enduring pattern of or disposition to experience sexual, affectional, or romantic attractions" primarily or exclusively to people of the same...
American talk show host.
Early life and career
Jack E. Jett grew up in Dallas, TexasDallas, Texas
Dallas is the third-largest city in Texas and the ninth-largest in the United States. The Dallas-Fort Worth Metroplex is the largest metropolitan area in the South and fourth-largest metropolitan area in the United States...
and moved to Los Angeles
Los Angeles, California
Los Angeles , with a population at the 2010 United States Census of 3,792,621, is the most populous city in California, USA and the second most populous in the United States, after New York City. It has an area of , and is located in Southern California...
at the age of 21. He held various jobs in the entertainment industry while in Los Angeles; among them, he was the Talent Agency Representative for the American Federation of Television and Radio Artists
American Federation of Television and Radio Artists
The American Federation of Television and Radio Artists is a performers' union that represents a wide variety of talent, including actors in radio and television, as well as radio and television announcers and newspersons, singers and recording artists , promo and voice-over announcers and other...
(AFTRA). He then went through the Creative Artist training program.
Through a fluke meeting at The China Club in the early 1980s, Mr. Jett was offered a contract to model for Cinq Deux Un ("521"), an agency in Tokyo
Tokyo
, ; officially , is one of the 47 prefectures of Japan. Tokyo is the capital of Japan, the center of the Greater Tokyo Area, and the largest metropolitan area of Japan. It is the seat of the Japanese government and the Imperial Palace, and the home of the Japanese Imperial Family...
, Japan
Japan
Japan is an island nation in East Asia. Located in the Pacific Ocean, it lies to the east of the Sea of Japan, China, North Korea, South Korea and Russia, stretching from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north to the East China Sea and Taiwan in the south...
. Jett's modeling career lasted for the next eight years. Then known as "Jhett," he became one of the highest paid male models in the world in 1982, with contracts in Milan
Milan
Milan is the second-largest city in Italy and the capital city of the region of Lombardy and of the province of Milan. The city proper has a population of about 1.3 million, while its urban area, roughly coinciding with its administrative province and the bordering Province of Monza and Brianza ,...
, Paris
Paris
Paris is the capital and largest city in France, situated on the river Seine, in northern France, at the heart of the Île-de-France region...
, Los Angeles, and Barcelona
Barcelona
Barcelona is the second largest city in Spain after Madrid, and the capital of Catalonia, with a population of 1,621,537 within its administrative limits on a land area of...
. Jett also appeared in Playgirl
Playgirl
Playgirl is a print quarterly adult magazine published in the United States that is marketed mainly to heterosexual women, but has also gained a considerable gay following...
that year, in a profile about his career and life in Beverly Hills
Beverly Hills, California
Beverly Hills is an affluent city located in Los Angeles County, California, United States. With a population of 34,109 at the 2010 census, up from 33,784 as of the 2000 census, it is home to numerous Hollywood celebrities. Beverly Hills and the neighboring city of West Hollywood are together...
. He met The Go-Go's
The Go-Go's
The Go-Go’s are an all-female American rock band formed in 1978. They made history as the first all-female band that both wrote their own songs and played their own instruments to top the Billboard album charts....
lead singer Belinda Carlisle
Belinda Carlisle
Belinda Jo Carlisle is an American singer who gained worldwide fame as the lead vocalist of the Go-Go's, one of the most successful all-female bands and the first such group whose members wrote their own songs and played their own instruments...
, and they quickly became best friends.
Upon retiring, or being retired from, modeling, Jett began to travel with The Go-Go's, handling various tasks such as press, travel, interview schedules, and luggage handling. During Carlisle's solo career, he worked as her personal assistant.
In 1988, Jett dropped the name Jhett.
Television production
He was offered the position of U.S. Representative for Prime TelevisionPrime Television
PRIME7 is an Australian television network owned by Prime Media Group Limited. Prime Television launched on 17 March 1962 as CBN/CWN in Orange and Dubbo, New South Wales, and has since expanded to cover regional New South Wales, Victoria and the Australian Capital Territory as a Seven Network...
, an Australian broadcast network. He worked as a liaison between the American production companies and the network's executives. Prime was an aggregator
Group purchasing organization
In the United States, a group purchasing organization is an entity that is created to leverage the purchasing power of a group of businesses to obtain discounts from vendors based on the collective buying power of the GPO members....
of television programming, supplying programming for local stations. Jett developed projects for these stations to produce, in addition to finding new programs from the United States for them to broadcast.
After a few years he grew tired of the long distance travel, and wanted to stay near his home in West Hollywood, California
West Hollywood, California
West Hollywood, a city of Los Angeles County, California, was incorporated on November 29, 1984, with a population of 34,399 at the 2010 census. 41% of the city's population is made up of gay men according to a 2002 demographic analysis by Sara Kocher Consulting for the City of West Hollywood...
. He accepted a position as a coordinator for the CBS Television City
CBS Television City
CBS Television City is a television studio complex located in the Fairfax District of Los Angeles at 7800 Beverly Boulevard, at the corner of North Fairfax Avenue...
comedy casting department. This position allowed him to find up-and-coming comedy talent in various Equity
Actors' Equity Association
The Actors' Equity Association , commonly referred to as Actors' Equity or simply Equity, is an American labor union representing the world of live theatrical performance, as opposed to film and television performance. However, performers appearing on live stage productions without a book or...
-waiver theatres and comedy clubs, and arrange meetings between those comedians and various casting executives.
By the time he was 40, Jett had lost 40 friends to the AIDS
AIDS
Acquired immune deficiency syndrome or acquired immunodeficiency syndrome is a disease of the human immune system caused by the human immunodeficiency virus...
epidemic. He began volunteer work with the charitable organizations Aid For AIDS
Aid For AIDS
Aid For AIDS is a California-based nonprofit organization, founded in 1983 and dedicated to improving the lives of people affected by HIV disease.-Services:...
, Elizabeth Taylor
Elizabeth Taylor
Dame Elizabeth Rosemond "Liz" Taylor, DBE was a British-American actress. From her early years as a child star with MGM, she became one of the great screen actresses of Hollywood's Golden Age...
’s amfAR
AmfAR
amfAR, The Foundation for AIDS Research, is an international nonprofit organization dedicated to the support of AIDS research, HIV prevention, treatment education, and the advocacy of sound AIDS-related public policy.-History:...
, and Cable Positive
Cable Positive
Cable Positive was founded in February 1992 by three concerned cable executives, Jeffrey Bernstein, then with Request Television, Brad Wojcoski of HBO and June Winters, with the mission of organizing cable's resources in the fight against AIDS...
.
The Jack E. Jett Show
In early 1990, Jett returned to his native Dallas, Texas. Having been an avid fan of public-access televisionPublic-access television
Public-access television is a form of non-commercial mass media where ordinary people can create content television programming which is cablecast through cable TV specialty channels...
cable TV in Los Angeles, Jett found a very limited public-access television selection in Dallas. He decided to create a show that featured various oddball characters and freaks of nature. The show became a local cult classic, and soon became available on cable access stations in New York, Los Angeles, San Francisco, Houston, and Austin.
PrideVision Television in Canada (later renamed OUTtv
OUTtv
OUTtv is a Canadian English language Category A specialty channel that airs entertainment and lifestyle programming for LGBT audiences.OUTtv's licensee is OUTtv Network Inc. which is 55.9% owned by Shavick Entertainment, 24.94% owned by Pink Triangle Press, 15% owned by Peace Point Entertainment...
) offered Jett the chance to move from public-access television to national cable television. He co-produced 65 episodes of The Jack E. Jett Show with Chris Rentzel; that show later became one of the first programs on the Q Television Network
Q Television Network
Q Television Network was an American cable television channel which aired programming targeted to the lesbian, gay, and bisexual audiences. It was owned by Triangle Multimedia. The channel aired a mix of film, documentary and music programming, along with a number of original talk and information...
, the first American television network catering to the LGBT
LGBT
LGBT is an initialism that collectively refers to "lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender" people. In use since the 1990s, the term "LGBT" is an adaptation of the initialism "LGB", which itself started replacing the phrase "gay community" beginning in the mid-to-late 1980s, which many within the...
community.
On Q Live
When radio DJ Jagger bowed out of a new program on Q Television called On Q Live, the hosting job was offered to Jett. The show was a four-hour chat fest that included various guests. The show was highly audience-interactive, with viewer call-ins, webcamWebcam
A webcam is a video camera that feeds its images in real time to a computer or computer network, often via USB, ethernet, or Wi-Fi.Their most popular use is the establishment of video links, permitting computers to act as videophones or videoconference stations. This common use as a video camera...
conversations, and email
Email
Electronic mail, commonly known as email or e-mail, is a method of exchanging digital messages from an author to one or more recipients. Modern email operates across the Internet or other computer networks. Some early email systems required that the author and the recipient both be online at the...
s. Over 150 episodes were produced. The show was seen five nights a week, and catered exclusively to the gay and lesbian community.
The Queer Edge
As someone who preferred his programs to be a little more "on the edge," Jett developed a show that would eventually become the network’s top premiere program. The Queer Edge with Jack E. Jett became an instant hit on the network. A quick wit combined with a unique interview style quickly made both Jett and the show a success. Each week a different co-host would join Jett. Co-hosts included CharoCharo
María del Rosario Pilar Martínez Molina Gutiérrez de los Perales Santa Ana Romanguera y de la Hinojosa Rasten , better known as Charo, is a Spanish-American actress, comedienne, and flamenco guitarist, best known for her flamboyant stage presence, her provocative outfits, and her trademark phrase...
, Kim Coles
Kim Coles
Kimberley "Kim" Coles is an American actress and comedian.-Career:Coles has appeared on many television shows, including Frasier , Six Feet Under, Celebrity Mole and The Geena Davis Show...
, Butch Patrick
Butch Patrick
Butch Patrick is a former American child actor. He is widely known for his role on the TV show The Munsters where he played Eddie Munster, the son of Herman and Lily Munster...
(The Munsters), and Randy Jones (The Village People).
Jett's regular co-hostess was Jackie Enx. Enx is a transsexual
Transsexualism
Transsexualism is an individual's identification with a gender inconsistent or not culturally associated with their biological sex. Simply put, it defines a person whose biological birth sex conflicts with their psychological gender...
radio personality, who hosted a segment called "Fun with Hypocrisy." Jackie was formerly known as Liam Jason, the drummer for the rock band Rhino Bucket
Rhino Bucket
Rhino Bucket is a hard rock band from Van Nuys, Los Angeles, California.The band was formed in 1988 by Georg Dolivo , Greg Fields , Reeve Downes , and Rick Kubach . This lineup played the Los Angeles rock scene for a year with contemporaries such as Junkyard, The Four Horsemen, Rage Against the...
.
A featured co-host was the internationally-famous Sandra Bernhard
Sandra Bernhard
Sandra Bernhard is an American comedian, singer, actress and author. She first gained attention in the late 1970s with her stand-up comedy in which she often bitterly critiques celebrity culture and political figures. Bernhard is number 97 on Comedy Central's list of the 100 greatest standups of...
. Jett and Bernhard hit it off right away, and she signed on to become a regular part of The Queer Edge. The Queer Edge with Jack E. Jett and Sandra Bernhard ran for another 40 episodes, until Q Television folded.
When Q Television began to falter, a new management team was sent in, but the network was never able to recover. As a result, Jett ended up with total ownership of the 145 episodes of The Queer Edge. Those episodes can now be seen in Canada, New Zealand, Australia, Belgium, Luxembourg, and The Netherlands. The shows can also be seen on TLA Video On Demand, as well as Jett’s own online channel, FUTV in JetTVision, operated in conjunction with World of Wonder.
The Queer Edge with Jack E. Jett and Sandra Bernhard was one of the first chat shows picked up by ManiaTV!
ManiaTV!
ManiaTV is a digital television network that produces, packages and distributes premium live celebrity TV shows for the 13-34 youth/young adult market. According to comScore, ManiaTV reaches over 10 million viewers each month. It was founded by Drew Massey....
.
Later work
In the year of 2001, Jack E. Jett released a DVD through TLA Video entitled The Gayest Show on Earth. This DVD quickly became a viral cult classic. The DVDs were sent to various college dorms around the world. The DVD quickly sold out and is out of print.Jett has been involved with Ring My Bell for World of Wonder TV. He has been a substitute host host for Cheaters
Cheaters
Cheaters is a weekly syndicated hidden camera reality television series that documents people who are suspected of committing adultery, or cheating, on their partners. Investigations are headed by the "Cheaters Detective Agency". The show is hosted by Joey Greco, the show airs on Saturday nights...
, and hosted a new pilot for Bobby Goldstein Productions, Love Sick.
The Dallas Observer stated that Jett was to host a new program on Dallas radio station KFXR-AM "CNN 1190"
KFXR (AM)
KFXR is a radio station in Dallas, Texas, programing classic country when it is not airing brokered programming. It began broadcasting in 1947 as KLIF...
starting on January 25, 2010. In the newspaper's blog posting announcing the show, Jett was quoted as saying The next day, station producer J.D. Freeman announced that the show had been cancelled, saying "The guy shows bad judgement, and I wouldn't put him on the air. Any personality who uses that language is not someone we want on the air."
As of May 2010, Jett was co-hosting a show with Rob Lobster on Dallas-area AM station KFCD
KFCD
KFCD is a radio station serving the Dallas-Fort Worth Metroplex that features religious radio programming. This station is licensed in Farmersville, Texas, USA, and the broadcast license is held by Bernard Dallas, LLC.-History:...
called ilume-A-Nation Radio, featuring what Jett called "guilty pleasure yourself songs," once-popular songs now widely disliked.
Personal life
Jett has been referred to as a “bomb thrower” for his "take no crap" blogBlog
A blog is a type of website or part of a website supposed to be updated with new content from time to time. Blogs are usually maintained by an individual with regular entries of commentary, descriptions of events, or other material such as graphics or video. Entries are commonly displayed in...
ging style.
External links
- http://www.cdumodels.com —website of Cinq Deux Un ("521") modeling agency
- http://www.tlavideo.com/vod/21 —on-demand viewing of The Queer Edge