(l-r) Rick Martinsen, co-writer, Point Pleasant; Jimmy Fields, host/producer, Red Bank; Frank Calo, producer/ director, New York; Steve Craig Bogard, founder of Aslan Youth Ministries, Asbury Park. When Jimmy Fields was a teenager growing up in Asbury Park, he got a little help along the way through a youth mentoring program.
Not one to forget a good deed, Fields, now a Long Branch pub owner, came up with the idea of hosting a reality TV show based on the pay-it-forward concept.
Together with Long Branch promoter Doug E. Fresh, Fields has produced a pilot of what they hope will become an ongoing “Pay It Forward” series focused on how recipients of a good deed pass it on to others.
“We don’t give a person a fish to eat for a day, but teach him to fish so when we leave, he can continue to eat for a lifetime,” said Fields, owner of the Draft House in West End and a retired Long Branch police officer.
Calo directs a scene for the pilot, which was filmed on location in Long Branch, Red Bank and Asbury Park. The pilot’s subject is Red Bankbased Aslan Youth Ministries, a nonprofit that serves urban youth and their families, which has locations in Long Branch, Asbury Park and Haiti. Fields said he chose the program because the nonprofit helped him during his youth.
“The pilot is formatted where we go into a person’s life and we try our best to commit to three tasks and get these three tasks done,” Fields said.
For Aslan, these three tasks involved a medical scholarship, bus repair, and social etiquette.
Fields said that he and his partners used their connections and resources from the entertainment industry to help accomplish these tasks.
A medical scholarship was secured to send a Haitian student to medical school in the expectation that the student would pay it forward upon graduating.
“With this scholarship, we’re going to be able to send him to medical school and then he’s going to pay it forward to the millions of people of Haiti,” Fields said.
Fields said that Aslan’s buses and vans are critical to the program and were in poor condition, so the show arranged to have a former Aslan member, who now owns a garage, provide lifetime service for the vehicles.
“It’s all coming back,” Fields said.
Fields himself hosted an etiquette lesson at the Draft House for Aslan youths whose parents might not have time to teach them these basic skills.
“They don’t know how to do the simple life skills that most people are taught by their parents. They’re being overlooked because the parents are working so much or there’s only one parent in the family,” he said.
Teens were taught dining etiquette, how to treat women in a positive manner, and how to dress and present themselves, Fields said. For the next episode, Fields said that Aslan would come along to help the next party.
“Through myself and the Aslan group’s networking and resources … they’re able to pay it forward,” he said.
Fields said that he would continue with each link as host.
Fields said he conceived the idea for the show two years ago after watching other charity-based reality TV shows, but he felt that the solutions those shows provided were temporary.
Fields said that producer and director Frank Calo immediately took an interest.
“I pitched it to him and his eyes lit up,” Fields said.
“It’s a sign of the times right now where we really need each other, and I think that’s what this whole concept is about,” Calo said.
Calo said that Oprah Winfrey’s new network, OWN, has first look at the finished pilot.
“We shot three days in Haiti, four days inAsbury Park, two days in Red Bank and one day in Long Branch,” Calo said.
“It’s going to show Jersey off in a good light.”
Fields’ mission for the show is to teach people how easy it is to use their own networking and connections to help others.
“It’s not about getting famous or the money, it’s about the actual movement, and if I can be the poster boy for helping people, then give it to me,” Fields said.
“I would love to do so because I know that I have been helped so many times through my life.
“It’s time for me to reach back and pay it forward to another.”