Juan Carlos Leveriza Cuenca, more popularly known as Jake Cuenca, was born on December 30, 1987 in San Jose, California, United States, where he grew up. His father is of Spanish descent and is from Valencia, Spain, while his mother is of Filipino descent. He has a brother named Rufo and a sister named Bea. He was also once a student of PAREF Southridge, a school for boys in Muntinlupa City.
Jake started his showbiz career at a tender age of nine after being discovered by a talent scout for Cosmo Modeling Agency. Soon after, he made several television and print commercials including endorsements for Safeguard, Coke and Globe Telecom. At age ten, he had a cameo role in the 1997 film Wansapanataym. It was followed by Takbo Barbara Takbo and Panday in 1998. All three films where under Star Cinema of ABS-CBN.
In 2003, he became a GMA talent center artist and appeared in the youth-oriented drama series, Click, in which he was picked to be one of the casts on its Batch 2. When the show was cancelled, Cuenca began portraying varied roles and was casted in Hanggang Kailan, Forever in My Heart and in the season 5 of Love to Love. In 2005, he starred as Kahlil in the fantasy series, Encantadia. He also appeared in the ninth season of Love to Love entitled "Miss Match", where he was paired with StarStruck season one reality show winner Jennylyn Mercado. In 2006, he starred as one of the wizards in the fantasy-themed television series, Majika, his last TV series on GMA before tranfering to rival network, ABS-CBN.
In the Kapamilya network, he became part of the cast of the network's soap opera, entitled Sana Maulit Muli, with Gerald Anderson and Kim Chiu. It was his first primetime drama series on the network. He also appeared in an episode of Love Spell, entitled "Sweet Sixty", starring opposite Philippine Pop Princess Sarah Geronimo. Later, he was cast on the fantasy series Lastikman. In 2008, he landed on the lead role in ABS-CBN's action series remake of Palos. In 2009, he played Anderson's fraternal twin brother in Tayong Dalawa. In the same year, he starred opposite Cristine Reyes on Precious Hearts Romances Presents: My Cheating Heart. In 2010, he portrayed the role of Alejandro on the Filipino remake of Rubi.
Jake has earned the reputation of being a playboy and has been romantically linked to several local actresses such as Bangs Garcia, Kim Chiu, Bea Alonzo, Roxanne Guinoo and Melissa Ricks.
