When Tyrese Was 17…

Actor/Singer Tyrese Gibson shared his memorable high school moments on MTV’s “When I was 17..” that aired this past weekend. During the segment, he revealed how he booked his first national campaign with Coca Cola that helped launch his career.

When I was 16 Coca Cola called my high school because they were auditioning for the national Coke campaign in all of the major cities. Locke High School was known as a school for specialty arts in music. So they called and talked to my music teacher Reggie Andrews. LA was the last city and this was the audition. I was about 2 ½ hours late and we got there and she was all packed up and she looked at me like “You’re late, I’m all done! The audition is over.”
I was like “Please let me audition.” I begged and begged for like ten minutes then she finally said, “Okay.” Then I went over there and I started singing and she looked at me like “Oh my God!” A week and a half later she called me and told me I got the gig. When I was 17, the Coca Cola commercial aired and my life changed. That very day I got picked up in a limousine from school. I just started getting invitations to award shows and events. I was getting chased in the malls….I mean it was nuts! It was my first audition ever, the first thing I ever booked. That’s a very big transition period in my life.

Tyrese’s Coca Cola Commercial led to guest roles on a few television shows, a record deal with RCA, and he eventually went on to snag a role in Baby Boy, which was originally intended for Tupac.