Actress Um Jung-hwa shared her experience with the child actor.
On the afternoon of the 12th, a production presentation for the Genie TV original drama 'My Troublesome Star' took place at The Saint Wedding in Guro-gu, Seoul. Director Choi Young-hoon, Um Jung-hwa, Song Seung-heon, Lee El, and Oh Dae-hwan attended the event and shared their thoughts.
'My Troublesome Star' is a romantic comedy that unfolds as South Korea's top star suddenly becomes an ordinary middle-aged woman, experiencing tears and laughter.
In the drama, Um Jung-hwa plays the role of Bong Cheong-ja (Lim Se-ra), who has been transformed from a 'national goddess' of the entertainment industry to 'just a national' after 25 years. Um Jung-hwa noted, "While doing makeup, we had a lot of discussions to embody Bong Cheong-ja after time had passed. We worked together to create Bong Cheong-ja's image. I wanted to portray the feeling of living with a lot of volume in my hair to cover my face. Because I haven't managed my appearance, blemishes and such remained. I also wore a lot of layers and actually ate comfortably during the filming. I gained weight for Bong Cheong-ja and tried to exaggerate my hair as well. So I felt really comfortable," adding, "Normally, there's a lot of attention to appearance checks during filming, but this time, I did a lot of appearance checks to look messed up."
Especially during her time as a 'national goddess', Lim Se-ra was known to be the sister of Jang Won-young from IVE, which had drawn attention even before the public reveal. In this regard, Um Jung-hwa said, "I was very concerned. It was a bit worrying about the proportions and how beautiful she was. She has a perfect figure. However, what was interesting throughout this discussion was that we both had a dot on the nose. Jang Da-ah's dot was in the middle, and mine was slightly off. I even did work to erase it and move it to where Jang Da-ah's was located. Seeing how naturally the image transformed, other actors commented that it connected well, which was very reassuring."
When asked whether she had discussed matching the characters with the child actor, Um Jung-hwa said, "I thought it would be good to take a habit, so I created a habit with my hands like flipping my hair to have something in common." Song Seung-heon commented, "In the past, I spoke in dialect as a rookie detective in Busan, but 25 years later, I wanted to show a new side without using dialect after coming to Seoul. After discussing it with the director, I acted without using dialect. We didn't set a commonality in actions or habits."
Lee El shared, "On the day of the reading, when we met face-to-face, I was surprised to see the flow of our faces. The two of us. When we monitored the broadcast, our angry outbursts and shouting acting were so similar that it was amazing. We didn't have many points of contact to adjust or make efforts, but it turned out similar, and I was rather surprised." Oh Dae-hwan also joked, "I saw the child actor on reading day. Since I'm not very tall, I thought it might be hard to find someone like me, but they cast a child just my size. I quickly realized that this child was meant for my role."
Meanwhile, 'My Troublesome Star' will air starting at 10 p.m. every Monday and Tuesday on ENA beginning on the 18th.
[Photo] OSEN Reporter Choi Kyu-han
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