7 Things About Han So-Hee Every K-Drama Fan Needs To Know
Han So-Hee is the Korean star turning heads for her turn in Netflix's latest K-drama series 'My Name'.
If you’ve watched The World of the Married, you’d be familiar with Han So-hee. The gorgeous actress first got her big break when she played the infamous mistress, Yeo Da-kyung, in the record-breaking K-drama.
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Since then, she has bagged other roles such as Yoo Na-bi in the Netflix show Nevertheless which also stars Sweet Home heartthrob Song Kang.
But Han has taken many of us by surprise with her latest role in Netflix’s hit K-drama series, My Name. The show sees the 26-year-old actress rocking a new image – that of a woman who abandons her name and identity and joins a drug ring to find her father’s killer.
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If you’re curious to know more about this stunning starlet, read on to learn a few interesting facts about her.
If you’ve watched My Name, you would’ve known that Han’s role in the show is a physically demanding one. To get into character, the actress worked with professional martial arts directors and gained 10kg of muscle from all her training. In fact, the actress also took it upon herself to carry around a knife just so that she could get used to the feeling and feel more comfortable playing the part in the series.
Han attended action school to get used to the movements and gestures for the show’s action scenes. She said: “I learned that I’m not all that graceful in moving my body. I had to attend action school every day of the week. But I became more motivated as I saw the gradual changes in my body, movements and gestures. It wasn’t easy, but the team at the action school really prepared me. So I felt less pressured in performing the action scenes than the emotional scenes. Accomplishing a flawless orchestration of an action scene was so rewarding. I had so much fun.”
Han mentioned that she took inspiration from different titles like Atomic Blonde and The Old Guard. “There are different styles of martial arts and one of the martial arts directors pointed out the style of Atomic Blonde which is a more long-take style," she said. "The biggest challenge regarding action was hurting others. If I didn’t practice enough, I could hurt others and I really didn’t want that, so I practised a lot to finish the series safely.”
Life for Han was not always smooth sailing – would you believe that she came to Seoul with less than 300,000 South Korean won (S$355) on her According to The South China Morning Post, a since-deleted article on Daum revealed that a young Han went to Seoul alone at the tender age of 19. Before her debut, she toiled hard at part-time jobs to make ends meet and one of her gigs was at a beer joint.
SHE MADE HER ENTERTAINMENT DEBUT IN A SHINEE MUSIC VIDEO
Before landing roles in K-dramas, Han made her first appearance in Shinee’s 'Tell Me What To Do' music video. “I didn’t even have an agency at that time so I got scouted through my own SNS (social media),” she told BNTNews in an interview. Subsequently, the photogenic beauty also made appearances in three other music videos — 'That Girl', 'The Hardest Part' and 'You&I'.
After snagging the role of Da-kyung, Han experienced unprecedented popularity. “It’s actually astounding. My life has changed. I’m not saying I’m happy that my life has changed, but I mean my life has literally changed, and I feel this is not something I have achieved,” she said in an interview with The Korea Herald.
Understandably, the hate she received for her role as Da-kyung also played a part in helping her rise the ranks, and Han agreed that Da-kyung was a pitiable character. “When I read the script, I felt sorry for Da Kyung. I thought, ‘Why must she behave this way to this point?’,” she told Dazed magazine.
HER ROLE MODEL IS ACTRESS KIM HEE AE
Getting to share the stage with the legendary Kim Hee Ae left Han starstruck, and she was inspired to work hard so that she could be like her role model. “After seeing her, I have come to think that I want to be like her. The roles played by Kim Hee Ae are mostly of women who lead the store, and I want to play such kind of characters too,” she said in an interview with Grazia.
This article first appeared in AsiaOne