Healer Assistant Writers' Q&A
Two assistant writers worked with Writer Song Ji-Na for
Healer. They were also the namesakes for two of the Someday News reporters, No
Sun-Jae and Park Chan-Young. These are some of the Q&A items that were
posted on Dramada.com. Translated here with their permission.
Q: How much do assistant writers write? Which parts did you
write? Writer Song Ji-Na mentioned that the Assistant Writers helped complete
the elevator scene… Which part are you most proud of?
PCY: I guess the question can be interpreted in two ways:
How much do assistant writers contribute in general? And to what extent did the
assistant writers contribute in this work (Healer)?
It is rather difficult to generalize what an assistant
writer does. It varies hugely depending on the main writer’s preferences, the
work progress, the abilities of the assistant writer him/herself, etc.
Narrowing the scope of this question down to “What roles did
assistant writers play in Healer?”
Well. What is this flowing from my eyes? Sweat? (A man doesn’t
cry… a man doesn’t cry… especially not on the first question of the Q&A…)
We made ourselves busy by coming up with backstories, new
ideas, background research, organization of meeting notes, script reviews, and
so on, but I personally think we didn’t help that much! Hahaha! (Sweating
continues)
Also, the miracle of us completing the elevator sequence did
not happen whatsoever.
What we did was study all night on how elevators work, brief
the Writer on our plan A, then upon her explaining what that wouldn’t work,
revise a plan B after more studying, get rejected, come up with plan C, get
rejected, rinse and repeat ad nauseam… something like that.
It occurs to me that if we had worked out a viable mechanism
just a bit sooner, the Writer would have finished writing the script for
episode 8 with less trouble.
NSJ: Some assistant writers write the first draft, which the
main writer uses as reference to write the actual script, but in our case, because
Writer Song Ji-Na has an established style and flair already, first drafts by
assistant writers doesn’t really help. Of course, it’s because our writing’s no
good. There are probably parts where our ideas have been incorporated somewhere
in the 1-20 episodes (I’ll believe so T_T), but she wrote it all by herself. I’m
just ashamed and sad that we couldn’t contribute a period she could use.
The elevator scene… we really studied all night long for
that T_T.
We managed to figure out how to drop the elevator by breaking its control panel and speed regulator, then make it stop precariously at some point , and have Jung-Hoo jump in for a rescue… (The lifeline harness was the Writer’s idea)
so all that was left to do was for him to escape by grabbing the cord going up as the elevator falls down… (by artistic license! I know you can’t do that at home, but if you do, you’ll die!!)
but then, the accelerated speed would kill Jung-Hoo and Young-Shin as they hit the ceiling. Or they’d break through the ceiling and go to foreverland.
We looked up several movies that featured elevator accidents, and they were all full of errors.
So we just convinced the Writer to go with this plan. (coughs)
Because of her meticulous nature, it took us talking to her all night before she gave in.
We had to make a field trip to Cheongju the next day, so both the Writer and I went to Cheongju without having slept that night.
Still, I felt elated for having contributed to the birth of the legendary episode 8.
Episode 8 not only has good romance and events, but also the best plot!
We managed to figure out how to drop the elevator by breaking its control panel and speed regulator, then make it stop precariously at some point , and have Jung-Hoo jump in for a rescue… (The lifeline harness was the Writer’s idea)
so all that was left to do was for him to escape by grabbing the cord going up as the elevator falls down… (by artistic license! I know you can’t do that at home, but if you do, you’ll die!!)
but then, the accelerated speed would kill Jung-Hoo and Young-Shin as they hit the ceiling. Or they’d break through the ceiling and go to foreverland.
We looked up several movies that featured elevator accidents, and they were all full of errors.
So we just convinced the Writer to go with this plan. (coughs)
Because of her meticulous nature, it took us talking to her all night before she gave in.
We had to make a field trip to Cheongju the next day, so both the Writer and I went to Cheongju without having slept that night.
Still, I felt elated for having contributed to the birth of the legendary episode 8.
Episode 8 not only has good romance and events, but also the best plot!
Q: 1. What is Writer Song like when the writing flows well
and when she hits a block? And the overall atmosphere of the studio?
2. Of all the dialogue of Jung-Hoo and Young-Shin, which
line is the most cheesy for you to say yourself? Of all the great lines of
Healer, which one had the most impact?
3. Pick someone of the opposite sex (from a given list of
Healer characters) you’d take to Moru Moru Island with you and explain why.
PCY: I’ll just answer the first question since I think most
people want to know more about Writer Song.
When the writing flows well, there’s nothing special. It’s
not like she can type via telekinesis or she insists on having shaved ice with
red beans when it’s going well. She just writes. Excitedly. Without
interruptions.
The problem is when she hits a block. There are many
symptoms. She often talks as she’s walking. Sometimes she messes her hair up.
Etc.
Personally, what impressed me the most is that no matter how
much pressure there is, even when the script writing is at halt, she smiles.
She smiles in agony.
How can she smile in this situation? Even as I marvel like
that, she smiles, contemplating fiercely, and arrives at an answer in the end.
(The Writer always finds the answer. As usual…)
As such a person is leading the studio, I don’ t think I
need to describe the atmosphere any further. She pulls the agonizing assistant
writers together and heads on… is how I feel. (It’s normally the other way
around, I think.)
+ regarding question 3, I’ll go with my girlfriend. I’d be
in trouble if I went with any other woman.
NSJ: 1. We just still our breath and wait for the script to
come out.
As the Writer always smiles and the assistant writers are easygoing, the atmosphere was always good. When she hits a block, she goes for a walk, and comes back after a lap with good ideas.
As the Writer always smiles and the assistant writers are easygoing, the atmosphere was always good. When she hits a block, she goes for a walk, and comes back after a lap with good ideas.
2. The Writer hates cheesy lines herself, so the romance is
rather trim. I personally wanted it to be a bit cheesier. There were so many
lines that made my heart fall, but personally I found Moon-Ho’s “Park Bong Soo”
followed by “Are you Jung-Hoo?” in episode 11 quite impactful.
3. From the available options, I’d pick Detective Yoon, but
I don’ t think he’s good for anything without his laptop. I’d pick Yoyo. He’s
good at fighting, and there might be scary things on the island. And maybe
Jong-Soo? He’s so easygoing, he’d adapt to and survive anywhere!
Q: What is the most important thing you learned while
working with Writer Song? And what part do you feel most attached to?
PCY: I learned a lot and gained a lot, but to pick one
thing, it’d be this: Rather than going with “this should happen at this point,”
choosing “wouldn’t this be fun?”
In other words, instead of just going along previously
installed guideposts, just fixing a guidepost somewhere in the distance. Whether
you can do this or not seems to be one of the differences between a writer and
an aspiring writer.
NSJ: There are so many things to learn from the Writer just
by observing her. The way she creates the characters and leads on just makes me
marvel. Each character is so unique… She follows the emotions of each character
as she lays down her plot. Her concentration, more than anything. To think and
think to the end.
We worked on background research and devising a timeline for
each character, and we also made the extra materials that appeared on the
broadcast such as news reports and Someday News keywords, so I find myself
attached to them. Check the facts again and again in case the information is
wrong… proof the character’s age and the timing of events… Even so, there were
many mistakes that appeared on the broadcast that made me upset. For example,
Jung-Hoo took the GED in 2005 when he was 19 (Korean) years old, so we even
tracked down the dates the GED was administrated that year, but for some reason
on the broadcast, it showed as 2007. I couldn’t sleep that night.
Q: Is there anything in common between the reporter
characters of Someday bearing your name and yourselves?
PCY: Chief Jang says in episode 3, “You proofread it and
still left 3 typos in an article?”
I don’t really make many typos. But I do make other mistakes
a lot. I felt a little prick in my heart when I saw the script. Is this how I
am represented in the subconscious of her mind? That must be. I’m ruined in
this life.
Just joking. I don’t think there’s much in common between me
and the reporter character. That’s what I believe.
NSJ: We don’t have much in common… When she was kind of
flirting with Bong-Soo when she first saw him, I was like, “No way… I’m not
like that.” The character’s purely created by the writer! I’d love to have her
looks though!
Q: How did you come to work on Healer?
PCY: The Writer did a workshop in 2011, and she picked five
final members for this workshop, and undeservingly, I got picked as the fifth
member. That’s how I met the Writer, and the rest is history.
When Healer was beginning to take shape, NSJ was working as
the only assistant writer. Then, as the work became more serious, there was a
need for one more person. (I’m sure they’re all regretting the fact that they
called me back then by now.)
NSJ: As PCY wrote already, I was a member of her workshop,
and I had joined her during the last 3 weeks of Faith, and she had suggested
doing the next work together, so I bit the bullet like a serpent!
Q: Which character’s creation did you help? Who is your
favorite character in Healer?
PCY: There’s no character that I created by myself. What we
contribute are only fragments. It was wholly the Writer herself that picked
those up and brought life into the characters. There are some of my fragments
that got incorporated, but nothing worth mentioning.
My favorite character is Young-Shin. She’s a modern woman. I
like Jung-Hoo, too, ofcourse, but Young-Shin is my favorite. “I’ll wait. I’ll
wait, but I’m also mad. Really mad.” I think that explains everything.
NSJ: The Writer had already figured out the 3 main
characters, and she had the big picture of other important characters. The
details were determined from our meetings. I don’t know if she still remembers,
but there are names I created such as Yeo Gi-Ja (Reporter Yeo’s name is really
Reporter Yeo) and Oh Gil-Han. Of course, the final decision was always the
Writer’s.
I can’t just pick a favorite character, as I love them all.
If I had to pick a few, I say the Hacker Lady, Detective Yoon, and the Great
Benefits Ahjussi (the ex-cop that left Seo Joon-Suk’s statement on tape).
Q: What do you do in your spare time?
PCY: I watch dramas and variety shows. I like to see my
friends and talk (what’s important is who I see and not whether I’m drinking
tea or alcohol). I also like sinking Karaoke.
NSJ: I watch movies and read books. I had tried competitive
dancing during the early days of my assistant writership, and I mean to do it
again.
Q: Which parts were most challenging to write?
PCY: There were a few challenges in our discussions.
Devising new traps. How to get out of those traps. Now to avoid Young-Shin
becoming a nuisance. How to maintain the atmosphere unique to Healer.
Whenever we were pining in agony, the Writer would swoop in
like a knight in shiny armor and fix it with simple solutions or not so simple
solutions at times.
NSJ: Ah… traps… T_T
We assistant writers were gathered together in a small room digging for a trap and got ourselves trapped instead… The Cheongju airport sequence was also in a pit…
In the end, the Writer solved it all.
However, I believe that our toil was not in vain! We made all the problems very obvious…
We assistant writers were gathered together in a small room digging for a trap and got ourselves trapped instead… The Cheongju airport sequence was also in a pit…
In the end, the Writer solved it all.
However, I believe that our toil was not in vain! We made all the problems very obvious…
Q: How did it feel to hear your names get called through the
Someday Reporters? How did they get named after you?
PCY: To be honest, we thought they’d be really minor roles
that would only appear in a couple of episodes with no dialogue and that their
names would never be called.
When the script for episode 3 was being written, most the
cast hadn’t been determined yet, either. When working on the synopsis, we had
maybe Chif Jang, Reporter Yeo, and Jong-Soo, but nothing about Chang-Young and
Sun-Jae.
So as the Writer was working on the script, she needed names
for a male and a female Someday Reporters, and she just told us that she’d use
our names because completely new names would be hard to remember, and we just said yes.
Back then, we had no idea that the roles would appear to the
end of the drama and the names would be used so much. Had we known, we’d have
come up with proper names.
When we went to the reading of scripts, the writers and the
directors sat in the middle, then the actors were sitting around the table, and
each person introduced him/herself in turn. I introduced myself, then NSJ did,
and then later, the actors introduced themselves, “I’m Kim Dong-Gyu playing the
role of Park Chang-Young” and “I’m Kim Jin-Hee playing the role of No Sun-Jae.”
I’m sure nobody cared, but I felt so embarrassed and could not see the face of
the actor.
A few days ago, as we were getting ready to leave the
wrap-up party, NSJ and actress KJH playing Reporter NSJ ran into each other by
chance, so the two of them talked, took pictures together, and I felt rather
envious. I have a Reporter PCY, too! Where is actor KDG? I should have sought
him out and exchanged a few words, I thought.
NSJ: We agreed to her using our names without any thoughts,
not knowing that these roles would have dialogue and just thinking that the
names were only needed for the script. Whenever our names came up on the
broadcast, I wanted to dig a hole for myself.
Q: Who picked out the songs Young-Shin sang in the drama?
PCY: The most important one, “Give me some water” was the
Writer’s pick.
When she felt a song as she was writing the script, she’d
just use that song right away, and if she couldn’t think of any, she asked us
what song YS should sing. We’d give her a few candidates, and she’d pick one
from those.
NSJ: In addition… “Lived unaware of the world” in episode 1
(when the Pirate Broadcast team appeared), “Day by Day” in episode 5, “Gladly,
gladly, let’s forget” in episode 8, and “Alleyway” in episode 9 are Writer Song’s
picks.
Q: As you watched the drama, which scene came out better
than you expected and which scene do you think could have been better?
PCY: Better than our expectation or imagination. That’s
easy. Too easy (After Jung-Hoo’s mom.)
Ending of episode 5, the CEO Hwang’s garden sequence and
ending of episode 8, the elevator sequence.
The last instruction in the script for episode 5 is “He knew
Young-Shin would react this way,” and I was totally surprised at how well he
executed that instruction. To be honest, I had thought it would be
realistically impossible for the actual scene to be better than what I had
imagined in my head after reading the script, no matter how well the directing
and acting was. Later, I heard actor Ji Chang-Wook talk to the Writer that he
had to put a lot of thought into it after he had received the script. They
probably had to shoot it in a single take because of the scope of the scene. They’re
just amazing.
Actor JCW said that he put a lot of thought into it, and the Writer responded that such instructions can’t be written without a deep trust in the actor. It felt like I was listening to a conversation of gurus.
Actor JCW said that he put a lot of thought into it, and the Writer responded that such instructions can’t be written without a deep trust in the actor. It felt like I was listening to a conversation of gurus.
And of course, we can’t leave out the elevator sequence of
the ending of episode 8. That scene was something you could only see in movies!
I was just so impressed by our directors watching that scene.
The scene that could have been better.
This one is hard to pick. As you all know, the scripts, the directing, the acting, and all of Healer are just great. In my personal opinion, to pick one, I’d say the Pirate Broadcast sequence from episode 1. As I think about it now, I feel like we could have done it differently.
This one is hard to pick. As you all know, the scripts, the directing, the acting, and all of Healer are just great. In my personal opinion, to pick one, I’d say the Pirate Broadcast sequence from episode 1. As I think about it now, I feel like we could have done it differently.
NSJ: There were so many scenes that went beyond my
expectations. The best of them is the elevator sequence! I had no idea that it’d
turn out like a movie! It was beyond my imagination. What I feel regrettable is
the ending of episode 20. It would have been better if it was the local grocery
store.
Many times did I marvel at the acting of the actors. They
just showed a performance beyond what I had imagined while reading the script.
Jung-Hoo and his Teacher’s scene in episode 10. “My father is a murderer and I’m
a thief!” Jung-Hoo and Moon-Ho’s scene in episode 12. “This guy and that guy,
all lies!” The scenes where Young-Shin was dancing. The ER scene in episode 13
when she figures Jung-Hoo’s identity out. When she meets her mother for the
first time. Moon-Ho at the junk yard. Myung-Hee in her seizures. Moon-Shik
breaking the glass. All scenes with Min-Ja? There’s just no end to it.
The Writer had chosen to have the last ending at a local
grocery store to signify that Jung-Hoo was now living an ordinary life, mingled
with ordinary people. That’s why it was supposed to be a grocery store, not a
rooftop.
Q: Did you watch the episodes as they were being aired? What
did you focus on as you watched? What were you like as you were watching? What
did you do right after watching?
PCY: Of course we did! We couldn’t miss even one episode.
There are reclining couches like what you see in the
American sitcom “Friends” in the big room of the studio. The Writer, NSJ, and
two assistants who joined us towards the end, Jin Han-Sae and Yoo Ah-Mi would
sit there. I sit on a Chairman’s chair (I’m sure you know what I mean) behind
them and watch the show. I put my legs on an office chair and recline.
After the episode, we discuss what we liked about that
episode (there weren’t things we would hate, right?). In our case, as we
already know what will happen as we’ve read the script, it’s difficult to watch
it like a regular viewer. My focus was on how fast the time seemed to pass, and
gauge whether the episode was more or less exciting based on that.
Then, at 7 in the morning, look at the viewership ratings
result, think to myself that those numbers can’t be trusted these days, then
went back to bed.
NSJ: We’d max out the volume and watch in intense
concentration and silence. The only sound that came out from us was laughter.
Q: What are your favorite scene, line, and acting
performance?
PCY: Best scene- “Give me some water” scene. I actually
laughed out loud.
Best line- “I had to see those eyes.” A close second is “What you asked me earlier, you’re right. I like Chae Young-Shin. Just so you know.” but I was touched the most when I read that line.
Best acting performance: “They even offered great benefits.” I can’t just pick one from Jung-Hoo, Young-Shin, and Moon-Ho’s performance because there are just too many I like.
Best line- “I had to see those eyes.” A close second is “What you asked me earlier, you’re right. I like Chae Young-Shin. Just so you know.” but I was touched the most when I read that line.
Best acting performance: “They even offered great benefits.” I can’t just pick one from Jung-Hoo, Young-Shin, and Moon-Ho’s performance because there are just too many I like.
NSJ: As I said earlier, the ending of episode 8 starting
with the elevator scene! Best acting performance was also answered above. (Plus
episode 14 where Jung-Who was asking “Why? Why?” after watching his Teacher’s
last words.) Best lines include “personal contact,” “I don’t know how to run
away,” and just so many.
Instead of favorite lines, I want to talk about when I was
touched when I first read the script. There are many scenes like that, but what
I remember the most are…
In episode 15, Moon-Ho’s “We remember you.” A memorial
broadcast for those not remembered…
In episode 18, Chi-Soo and Young-Shin sharing the cookie Myung-Hee made…
In episode 19, Young-Shin’s line, “If we do this broadcast, maybe that crazy old man called the Elder might fear us. I’d like him to become afraid of us.”
In episode 18, Chi-Soo and Young-Shin sharing the cookie Myung-Hee made…
In episode 19, Young-Shin’s line, “If we do this broadcast, maybe that crazy old man called the Elder might fear us. I’d like him to become afraid of us.”
I felt my heart get warm and overcome with emotion when I
first read them. I’d really like for those in power to become afraid of us.
Q: How were the remote conversations between Healer and the
Hacker Lady shot?
PCY: We were also impressed by this part. It’s a
collaboration of directing, editing, and the acting performance of actors Ji
Chang-Wook and Kim Mee-Kyung.
When we watched the last episode in theater, Actress Kim
Mee-Kyung said something about how she had gotten used to saying her lines by
herself in a studio so that she felt awkward to be actually interacting with
people in episodes 19 and 20.
NSJ: I know that the directors and the actors had a lot of
discussions about this. I think they would shoot Jung-Hoo’s scenes first and
then the Hacker Lady would act while watching Jung-Hoo’s scenes, but I don’t
think they could do that for every scene, although I’m not sure.
[Writer SJN’s answer to this question is posted at the end
of this other post.]
Q: If you could jot down some notes on Young-Shin and
Jung-Hoo’s future after the ending of episode 20, what would that be?
PCY: Mr. and Mrs. Healer. I’d love to see them get into
action together. The ending was such a tease.
NSJ: I’d like to see Mr. and Mrs. Healer, too. I’ll be
content with the ending though. I want to savor the feelings of the ending
rather than imagining.
Q: If you could have the skills of Healer, what would you
want to do right now?
PCY: What are Healer’s skills? Stamina, agility, fast
thinking, money, information, spatial reasoning, disguise. I don’t need all
those. What I would like to have the most is Healer’s face. What would I want
to do with that? No comment.
NSJ: What I want is the nature of heading straightforward!
The will power to jump into action without just thinking! The determination!
Courate! (It’s about time for me to stop thinking and start acting…)
But what could I do with these right now?
Q: Is there anything you couldn’t incorporate that you
wanted to include?
PCY: When Jung-Hoo fakes his death in the last episode, it
would have been nice to have it look realistic so that the viewers would have
really fallen for it. It was something we had to give up on because of the
restrictions we had in reality and in the plot. The Writer had been talking
about Jung-Hoo talking a key evidence he took from the Elder and flee in an aircraft,
which then explodes. Then, when everybody thought him dead, he comes back with
that evidence. It’s sad that this didn’t work out.
NSJ: Things get changed as the story moves along. I’m not
sure if I may say this, but when Moon-Ho is kidnapped in episode 18, the Writer
had first thought of throwing an unconscious Moon-Ho into a pit at a
construction site. The episode would end with a concrete-mixer slowly
approaching from the distance! (We were gonna pour concrete on Moon-Ho!
Also, we had a discussion about Moon-Ho serving jail time,
taking responsibility of everything for Jung-Hoo and Young-Shin. We imagined
him handcuffed and in a prisoner uniform, smiling as he is being escorted. This
plan was canceled because leading the story to get him handcuffed in a prisoner
uniform was too difficult.
Q: Does Jung-Hoo know that his mom had left him in order to
protect him?
NSJ: Episode 13 shows the past of Jung-Hoo and his mom. Jung-Hoo
had forgiven her then. It didn’t matter why she left him. Maybe he didn’t know,
or maybe he knew. Both of them hide a lot for each other so as not to put each
other in danger, so even if he knew, he’d pretend ignorance. That’s why they
could see each other again and share shaved ice with red beans.
I think that as Jung-Hoo sat on the swing and smiled, he
thought back to that time and was happy with that memory.
Q: What did you think of the casting choice of Actors Ji and
Park!
NSJ: At first, I thought the choice was great! And as the
show progressed, what we said the most was what would we have done if we didn’t
have those two actors!
PCY: In my case, I didn’t have the same level of confidence
as Writer Song. At first.
I thought they were good actors, and that the cast was not bad for a miniseries. That’s what I was like back then. I could even imagine other actors playing the roles of Jung-Hoo and Young-Shin in my head.
I thought they were good actors, and that the cast was not bad for a miniseries. That’s what I was like back then. I could even imagine other actors playing the roles of Jung-Hoo and Young-Shin in my head.
Now? That’s impossible. Not imaginable.
Seo Jung-Hoo is basically Ji Chang-Wook himself, and Chae
Young-Shin is Park Min Young herself.
This was an irreplaceable cast.
This was an irreplaceable cast.
Leaving all things behind, I’m a fan of the two now. I
managed to get actor Ji’s autograph at the wrap-up party, but I still regret to
this day that I didn’t get one from actress Park. (Still got to take a picture
with her though.)
Q: Looking at the script, I found that actor Ji often had
added adlibs and changed the sentence endings to his lines. Did any of them
leave a big impression on you?
NSJ: I had a lot of LOL moments with ad libs. What come to
my mind now are...
episode 5, at the café, “It hurts!” and his reaction to confirm that he didn’t forget to report to the police.
episode 19, when he saw the Hacker Lady for the first time and mumbled, “You go around in that outfit?”
episode 20, when Sang-Soo hit Yoyo, “Some teamwork.” I remember them because they’re recent. There are many more, but it’s hard to look for them now, so I’ll stop here.
episode 5, at the café, “It hurts!” and his reaction to confirm that he didn’t forget to report to the police.
episode 19, when he saw the Hacker Lady for the first time and mumbled, “You go around in that outfit?”
episode 20, when Sang-Soo hit Yoyo, “Some teamwork.” I remember them because they’re recent. There are many more, but it’s hard to look for them now, so I’ll stop here.
PCY: The way I see it, actor Ji Chang-Wook had become
totally possessed by Seo Jung-Hoo, so his ad libs didn’t go overboard. Same
with the sentence ending variations.
What left a big impression? I guess I also am reminded of
the recent one about nice teamwork.
Q: I read in Writer Song’s Q&A that you wrote down all
the fragments of ideas and organized them, did you handwrite them in notes and
organize them by a certain rules, or sort them by chronological order? Or were
they all digitized?
NSJ: Sometimes we’d type them on our laptop during our
meetings, or take notes and then later organize them and post on the Writer
Team board. We post each day’s meeting notes that day.
PCY: We work on our laptop to organize what was discussed at
our meetings. Sometimes we record it on our smartphones.
Q: What do you think of Jung-Hoo’s mom’s decision?
NSJ: Although this wasn’t brought up much in the show,
Joon-Seok’s lawyer was Secretary Oh under the pseudonym of Baek Seung-Jong. He
approached JS like that and took care of him in the same way he did Go
Sung-Chul, Hwang Jae-Gook, and Gi Young-Jae, and as Jung-Hoo’s mom was being a
pain by poking everywhere to clear her husband’s name, he threatened her with an
indifferent smile on his face. Moon-Shik played a role here, too.
Jung-Hoo’s mom felt like the attention of the bad guys and
the media would be on Jung-Hoo if she was with him, and she thought she’d be
found even if she ran away with her son, and he’d have the stigma of being a
son of a murderer. So back then, she must have thought that Jung-Hoo would be
safe if she left. That her leaving him and living a quiet life was the best for
him. One could understand that choice or criticize her, but given those
circumstances at the time, it might have been the best course of action for
Jung-Hoo’s mom.
Q: Was there any acting performance of actress Park
Min-Young that surprised you? I wonder if she spent a lot of time on
researching her character and discussed things with the writers, too.
PCY: I personally liked actress Park Min-Young’s crying
scenes. I’m the kind of viewer that thinks, “What? Why’s she crying?” if I don’t
understand the emotions of that actress, but when PMY cries, I would think, “That’s
right. Young-Shin is a kindhearted character indeed.”
To name a specific scene, in episode 14, when she goes, “Is
he alright? Is he not alright?” then “Just where is he?! Please!” with her eyes
full of tears, that moment of Young-Shin left a big impression on me.
Lastly, to add something about actress PMY,
In the beginning, both actors would often visit the studio
and ask the Writer about their characters, and one day, she came with lots of
ideas about YS’s attire. She had brought her tablet with lots of fashion
pictures for reference. She’d say, “How about this? I was also thinking about
this,” to the Writer, and as I watched from the side, I was impressed that our main
actors were all very ambitious about their acting.
NSJ: Actress PMY also came to the studio several times
before we started to discuss the character with the Writer. She had taken a lot
of notes as she read the script, too. (Both actors would open up their
notebooks as soon as they sat down and take notes so diligently.)
As the Writer had mentioned, you could see the passion in them of wanting to try, wanting to transform themselves. Judging from her speech at the KBS Drama Awards, she must have had a lot of thoughts on her acting. I had thought her acting skills had reached a certain level even before, so I was happy to see Young-Shin.
As the Writer had mentioned, you could see the passion in them of wanting to try, wanting to transform themselves. Judging from her speech at the KBS Drama Awards, she must have had a lot of thoughts on her acting. I had thought her acting skills had reached a certain level even before, so I was happy to see Young-Shin.
She was lovely in scenes where she was singing and dancing
and when she’d cover her eyes as she explained to detective Yoon about when she
met Healer, and she must have cried for real when she met her mother for the
first time, as her face got really red. I couldn’t help but admit that she’s a
good actress.
4 comments
Thank you thank you thank you. This was wonderful, engaging read. These two writers are witty and humble and I imagine they must be a joy to work with. What wouldn't I give to learn the craft with SJN.
ReplyDeleteThank you very much
ReplyDeletei have never realised the importance of writer and their assistance until this show.. because most of previous drama, i am just please with viewing some pretty faces in the likes of Joon Won or Lee Junki or Lee Minho... and i hardly remember lines said by them... but this drama lift me up to another league, and i can never look at a kdrama with the same eyes any more. its not just admiring Ji Chang wook and Minyoung pretty faces that matter, it also help when you their acting make you forgot they are changwook and Minyoung... makes you not interested to go and re-watch empress Ki ... but the essence of whole drama also lies in the excellent lines, moving lines, witty lines, humorous lines, not just from main leads, also from ahjumma, teacher, papa chae... lines that accompanied you and tuck you into bed, unable to sleep, lines that stayed in your head the next day when you are still working... lines like "i don't know how to run away", "i Knew it", "i can live the way you want", "even if you cannot find, come back"... "things i likes...".."i need to see the eyes"..."i did not wait long, you come to me"(dad chae) "with the woman you loved, 2 kids, 1 dog, 2 cats, and 3 goldfishes".... this drama spoilt us, till we can never look at another drama with the same eyes any more... and even if changwook act in another drama... it completely different, i am still yearning for Jung Hoo and Youngshin.. this is the diff between this drama and many dramas in past, present and future. Healer, is in another league already.
ReplyDeleteOH MY GOD. HOW HAVE I ONLY JUST FOUND OUT ABOUT THIS BLOG?! :O
ReplyDeleteAbsolutely love this blog and this post and all the other posts!!