Actor Park Joong-hoon expressed deep gratitude to Ahn Sung-ki, who had a major influence on his acting life.
On the March 3 broadcast of Channel A "Close friends Tokumentary - table for four," actor Park Joong-hoon invited his close friends Heo Jae and Kim Min-jun to his home.
That day Park Joong-hoon explained why his and Heo Jae's university admission years differ despite being high school classmates: "I repeated a year. It's an embarrassing story, but in my first year I took the theater and film exam not at Chung-Ang University but somewhere else. I mixed up the interview day and didn't go. I was automatically disqualified. Even now I think it was the worst day of my life. So I repeated a year and went to Chung-Ang University," he revealed behind the scenes.
He continued, "Because I repeated a year, I had no reason to contact (Heo Jae) for a year. It was the analog era, so contact was cut off. When I went to school, that tall guy showed up. When I said I had been admitted to the theater and film department, his expression scoffed." Heo Jae said, "When he said he got into Chung-Ang University's theater and film department, I thought he was lying. But he said he was going to appear in the movie 'Kkambo'. He said it was hundreds-to-one, but he was picked."
Park Joong-hoon recalled, "From my freshman year I shot 16mm student films, did lighting and acting, and since there were no pagers I made handmade business cards. From freshman year I tracked down seniors who went to sets and handed them out to people I met, asking for audition opportunities. Then I was asked to come to the 'Kkambo' audition. They asked me only a few lines and told me to leave. They said, 'We'll contact you,' but I didn't get a call, so I went much later. I said, 'I came because you didn't contact me.' They said, 'You weren't cast,' so I asked them to at least let me come to the film company, and I ran errands for more than a month or two," he remembered his debut.
He said, "After asking them to give me one audition chance, I did all sorts of things for an hour. Later I even wore only underwear, imitated Rocky, and changed costumes. It wasn't that I wasn't embarrassed, but nothing else mattered. The next day I went to the film company and they said, 'We've decided on you,' 'We chose someone who's never acted, so you must do well,' and that started 'Kkambo.' I was lucky. The second leading role was 'Mimi and Cheolsu's youth sketch,' which came in first. I worked with the late actress Kang Soo-yeon. I was 21 and had a box-office No. 1, so I felt like I could carry the world on my shoulders and be grateful," he recalled how he rose to stardom right after his debut.
Afterwards, Park Joong-hoon, who received great love by co-starring with the late Choi Jin-sil in 'My wife, my bride,' said, "I remember a lot. Another actress was considered and I liked her. But someone suggested the actress Choi Jin-sil, and I opposed it. The film company and director said let's try it, so we filmed it. She acted very well. She was so pretty and charming. By the time of the release, Choi Jin-sil's popularity had risen more. On some posters her face was large and mine was small and shrunk. Within months it became a syndrome. A few years later I also did 'To Kill a Wife' with her and our bond deepened," he said.
But Park Joong-hoon suddenly went abroad to study. He said, "Shooting and being busy and popular is good, but living only by others' schedules from waking to sleeping felt like not living my way. I thought, what if I live like this blankly? I wanted to think a bit and study English. Looking back now it's intellectual posturing, but I thought I'd get a master's degree at New York University. It would look good, so I went to study abroad. I earned a master's and met my wife there. It means a lot to me in many ways," he said.
When asked about his first meeting with his wife, he said, "On a weekend I went to a bar. It was a Japanese-style trendy bar. She worked as a bartender there once a week. That person looked like me. I liked her, so in English I asked, 'Are you Korean?' She said, 'I'm Korean.' I asked, 'Do you speak Korean?' and she said she couldn't. She was a third-generation Korean in Japan, so her first language was Japanese. I went there for weeks but a date never happened. Then one month later I was sitting in the university cafe and she came in. We were both surprised, so our guard dropped. We started dating and got married. I thought fate works like this," he shared his love story.
After studying abroad, Park Joong-hoon struck big again with 'Two Cops.' He said, "Senior Ahn Sung-ki and I were thankfully called national actors, and I heard that for the first time with 'Two Cops.' 'Two Cops' was a film like a national festival." About 'No mercy for the ruthless' he said, "We shot the fight scene in front of the closed Taebaek coal mine and were rained on for ten days from waking to sleeping. Later the rainwater wouldn't stop. At that time I was in my early 30s and still had energy, but just seeing it I vomited after shooting. It was hard," he complained. But he added, "It became an irreplaceable film for me." He said, "Jonathan Demme, director of 'The Silence of the Lambs,' saw this film and I went to Hollywood. It's an important and grateful film for me. 'The Matrix' also paid homage to this film. There were many good things in my acting career," he said.
Park Kyung-rim asked, "Isn't there someone in your film life you can't separate from? Senior Ahn Sung-ki did four films with you including 'Two Cops,' 'No mercy for the ruthless,' and 'Radio Star,' right?" Park Joong-hoon replied, "To me he is truly irreplaceable. He's a companion and means a lot to me. He's like a father. If I were a balloon, Senior Ahn Sung-ki tied a stone to the string so I wouldn't fly away. If that stone weren't there, I think I would have burst while flying. As you know, his health is not very good now. I recently told him, 'My life was so good because you were there,' and he smiled faintly with little strength, and I felt very emotional. I was told off for trying to hold back tears," he said, choking up as he spoke about Ahn Sung-ki, who is undergoing treatment for recurrent blood cancer.
He said, "One day Senior Ahn Sung-ki told me, 'We were close, but over the long years you may have made mistakes.' He said, 'I'm especially fond of you because of your father.' He said my father went to meet Senior Ahn at the film screening afterparty without telling me, bowed his waist and asked him to look after Jong-hoon, greeting him many times. 'The reason I'm tolerant when you make mistakes is because of your late father,' he said," recounting their special bond.
Park Joong-hoon, who said he never went against his father's words except for debuting as an actor, said, "Back then if I said I wanted to be an actor, my father would call it 'entertainer,' and my father was a public servant who wanted me to follow in his footsteps and become a public official. Later, after I became an actor and worked hard at my job, he became my greatest supporter. One day he suddenly came and said he was sorry for opposing me, saying he hadn't expected it to turn out this way, and told me, 'Take all my fortune.' I wondered why he said such things, and a month or two later he died of a heart attack. I had a dream of entering Hollywood. It was an unrealistic dream, but my father knew it well. A few months after he passed away, as if by a miracle, I was contacted by Hollywood to do a film. It felt like a dream," he confessed.
He said, "While filming I asked the director to name my character after my father. My father's name was 'Il-sang,' and I heard my father's name during the six months of shooting. I felt like my father helped me," he said emotionally.
Now approaching his second thirty, Park Joong-hoon said, "I like the idea of aging as long as I stay healthy. I've never lived it before, so it's surprising. I'm proud to be 60. I couldn't believe I'd reach my 60th birthday. Looking back, the recent book I wrote is called 'Don't regret.' Since my 20s my principle was 'have regrets but no remorse' and I lived like that, but at this age there are so many things I regret. In my 20s and 30s I thought everyone in the world was watching only me. I thought the world revolved around me. I wonder how much people put up with me. If I could live again, I would change that. If someone asked me to make a wish, I would go back and apologize to those I wronged," he reflected on his immature years.
Park Joong-hoon said, "I even thought for months about writing these stories as a film scenario titled 'Sorry Man.' In my 20s and 30s I was too passionate. I showed anger when angry. I wish I had expressed emotions more maturely. I've never seen Senior Ahn Sung-ki or junior Jang Dong-gun have a fight. I've never seen their voices raised. But they are magicians at conveying any emotion they can express. I wanted to learn that one thing. That's character. If I could go back, I think I could live differently," he said.
When asked why he published an essay, he said, "I hadn't thought about it, but junior Cha In-pyo shines as a writer. I see him often, and after exercising he suddenly said at a meal, 'Brother, write your life story as a book.' It's a heavy request. In my mid-30s I wrote a weekly column in a daily newspaper for a week. After that there was talk of a book, but I thought 'books are for when you're 60' and didn't publish. Now the time has come, but I still lacked confidence. But I was encouraged so much that I did it. If not for that, I wouldn't have written it," he revealed the backstage story.
He added, "And now I haven't acted for so long that as an actor I want to greet audiences. That's how I feel. If I act again, I tell myself and the juniors I want to become a 'famous rookie actor.' I'm actually determined to do so," he said.
[photo] Channel A
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