Five questions with
Second time’s the charm for the actor who plays a dual-role character on his TV comeback.
THREE years is a long time for an actor to be away from the limelight. But when you’re someone as charismatic as Hyun Bin, that period of absence could feel like an eternity for ardent fans.
The lanky leading man (he stands at 1.84m) captivated audiences when he played a snobbish and eccentric who fell in love with a stuntwoman in the small screen fantastical romantic-comedy juggernaut that is
in 2010. After that, the Seoul native had his sights set on feature films – appearing in and
The latter – an English-language co-production between South Korea, Hong Kong, China and the United States – became one of the
highest- grossing Korean films in China.
At the height of his star power, Hyun Bin boldly took a break from showbiz in early 2011 when he served his 21-month compulsory military service in the Republic of Korea Marine Corps, which is considered to be the toughest service branch.
While some stars received flak for their half-hearted military service, the Chung-Ang University theater graduate was honoured with a citation for being an exemplary soldier when he was discharged in late 2012.
Since then, the 32-year old has been shooting commercials and appeared in his first ever period film ( Now, he wants to enthrall television viewers once more with
In an interview transcript provided by ONE HD, the man talked about his small screen comeback and his experience playing a character with split personalities among
other things. What do you want to achieve through this new drama?
It has been a long time since I last greeted my fans through television since my return from the military service.
I received the script for midway through the filming of
and I decided to make this TV comeback with a light-hearted and cheery drama that anyone would find it easy to watch.
This is not your first time playing a chaebol character (son of a wealthy man), is this why you picked this role as your TV screen comeback?
I didn’t pick the role because the character is a I chose it because I thought the concept of a man with a dual-personality and a woman who loves a man with a dual-personality was interesting.
I want to present a completely different Hyun Bin to the audience and intend to act on a role of an ambivert with split personality.
How is the challenge of playing someone with multiple personality disorder on Hyde, Jekyll, Me, compared to playing a man and woman in Secret Garden? Acting as a woman in
was hard ( it made me cringe?
But I must say that it was way easier to act in compared to I had someone that I could study. There was Ha Ji-won (the female lead in for me to watch and observe.
So there is a difference in that I don’t have anyone to mimic and have to express two personalities through imagination. My character in requires a lot of imagination.
Shall I say
How special is this series to you? I am attached to all of my projects but I really liked this series because it’s been way too long since my last TV gig.
You have an impressive physique while shooting The Fatal Encounter. Did you have to keep fit for this new role?
I asked (the
director) what kind of body they wanted for this role. They said they didn’t want the muscles that were shown in
so I gained some weight.