J.T. TEPNAPA is an international award-winning filmmaker who has also appeared in many plays, features, shorts, and commercials.
In 2001, he directed, wrote, and starred in his first short film, Sunflowers, which appeared at that year’s Austin Gay & Lesbian Film Festival and Tucson’s Outwest 2001.
In 2002, J.T. wrote and directed Masturbation: Putting the Fun into Self-Loving, a parody of 1950s health education films. Masturbation went on to become a smash hit, screened in film festivals in six countries, receiving numerous awards and international distribution. The short has even been featured in college sex education classrooms and documentaries.
J.T. went on to write, direct, and produce two more short films, Drag Queen Heist (2004) and Begging for Change (2006). Both films received Best Short honors at QCinema’s Fort Worth International Gay and Lesbian Film Festival.
SKILLED IN WRITING both comedy and drama, J.T. was described by festival director Barbara Lee as “more than the just director of comedy films. He has become an artist of film, able to reflect to us reality, whether it is absurd and laughable or serious and important.”
J.T.’s screenplay, Outing Joey, received top honors in Rhode Island’s Barren Branches GLBT Screenplay Competition. Competition coordinator Adam Short described the film as a “twist on contemporary gay and straight stereotypes bringing perspective to the tension between these two groups.”
For eight years, J.T. has appeared on the longest-running Web series, Star Trek: Hidden Frontier, where he plays openly gay Lieutenant Commander Corey Aster. He also plays the role of Mr. Sulu in the Hugo-nominated Web series, Star Trek: Phase II, winner of TV Guide’s Online Video Award for Best SciFi Series.
FEATURED IN Variety, Frontiers, Fab magazine, the Today Show, MSNBC, and other international news outlets, J.T. is honored to be a part of the phenomenon that brings gay and science fiction together in the same sentence.
J.T. has a B.A. in acting from the University of California, Irvine.
