After getting into a fight at school in Dallas at 14, Jonathan was enrolled "in an alternative education program," and it is there that he first discovered his love of performing. "We were reading Agatha Christie and I just got into it," he recalled to The Last Magazine in June 2019. "I grew up reading the Bible all the time and I would compare the King James version and other versions and be like, 'Oh, I like this version better.' I just loved reading and I have an active imagination and liked acting out the scene."