Lee Jong Hwa, who is professionally known as Jota, is one of the members of the K-Pop boy group Madtown. (Photo : YouTube/TV-People)
K-Pop boy group Madtown member Lee Jong Hwa, 23, who is professionally known as Jota, is one of the most famous TV stars in South Korea nowadays. Recently, the singer and model won the Best Variety Star award at the 12th Annual Soompi Awards.
Since 2014, Jota has been appearing in several variety shows. In 2016, he was a cast member of "Escape Crisis No. 1, "Baek Jong-won's Three Great Emperors," "Same Bed, Different Dreams," "Law of the Jungle in Tonga," "We Got Married" and "Real Men."
Jota was also a contestant in the MBC variety show "King of Mask Singer" in 2016. In the same year, he appeared as a guest in "I Love You" and "Wednesday Food Talk."
The winners of the annual survey were announced on March 2, Thursday, by Soompi. With Fuse and ZANYBROS as partners, the United States-based online news provider specializing in Korean pop culture received almost 100 million votes from hallyu fans from 139 countries across the globe from Dec. 19, 2016 to Jan. 16.
In the Best Variety Star category, Jota defeated nine other variety stars. They were Bomi, Eric Nam, Gary, Hani, Kim Heechul, Leeteuk, Nam Joo Hyuk, Sandeul and Solar.
Fans chose "Running Man" as the Best Variety Show. The other nominated variety series were "2 Days & 1 Night," "Hit the Stage," "Infinite Challenge, "Problematic Men," "King of Masked Singer," "Sister's Slam Dunk," "The Return of Superman," "We Got Married" and "Weekly Idol."
"Be Positive" was chosen as the Best Web Series. It defeated "Choco Bank," "Dramaworld," "Gogh, the Starry Night," "High-End Crush," "Investigator Alice" Season 2, "Nightmare Teacher," "Spark" "Thumping Spike" and "Touching You."
The Best Foreign Drama award was given to "My Amazing Boyfriend." The other nominees were "Whirlwind Girl 2," "Ode to Joy," "Price of Wolf," "Love O2O," "Koe Koi," "Kiss the Series," "Ice Fantasy" and "God of War, Zhao Yun."
Watch the 12th Annual Soompi Awards here:
