Joo Won Meets Shim Eun Kyung on the Set of Tomorrow’s Cantabile

It’s Korean Nodame and Chiaki together! More accurately it’s Seol Nae Il and Cha Yoo Jin together at last in the first stills of the leads filming Tomorrow’s Cantabile. KBS continues to pace the release of new stills for its upcoming Mon-Tues drama, which might be a good thing if it succeeds in whetting the appetites of the viewers since the current drama in that time slot is the low-rated Discovery of Love. KBS needs a hit but I’m skeptical that Tomorrow’s Cantabile will deliver. It might but bear in mind that manga or manhwa adaptations have been a series of epic fails in K-dramas for the last few years in terms of garnering domestic ratings. Group 8 keeps on churning out such adaptations and this one is also coming from that very company which produced Boys Before Flowers, Playful Kiss, Pretty Boy, Tamra the Island, and Goong.

Luckily for KBS Joo Won is a pretty reliable hit maker when it comes to dramas and his dramas on KBS have been rollicking successes for the network. Pair him up with current acting queen Shim Eun Kyung and the K-viewers may actually tune in come October 13th when the drama premieres. The first OTP stills have this interesting lens filter effect of making it feel like a rainy green-tinted afternoon, maybe with a lot of mold around. Don’t get me wrong, the color scheme is actually quite pretty albeit hard to place. Joo Won does have one leg up on J-counterpart Tamaki Hiroshi in looking the age of a musical college student the way he strides around campus. Despite Hiroshi being only 26 when he did Nodame he always looked older than the character’s age. Shim Eun Kyung continues to look just perfect for the part of a oddball piano prodigy with her shining eyes and endearing smile.


Comments

Joo Won Meets Shim Eun Kyung on the Set of Tomorrow’s Cantabile — 40 Comments

      • Haha I was thinking the same thing. I was hoping the recently released promotional pic of Nodame was not an accurate depiction of her character in the drama but I guess she really is much cleaner in this version. And Joo Won strutting to class in his white dress shirt… *droolz*

    • As for me, Nodame rather look clean and neat almost all the time in the japanese drama. There are only few episodes where she looks really messy so SEK’s look her is a pass.

  1. yeah lol
    Why are they so dolled up ? Uggghhhh idk how i feel
    Joo won just doesn’t cut it for me and SEK looks so pretty but not nodame-ish?

    • Yeah, cringe was my first reaction. She’s too clean and neat (though the dressing is a bit improved on the offbeat scale), and his hair is… the hairstyle definitely ages him. What’s with the horizontal stripe that runs across his shirts? And that bag… um…

      Tamaki Hiroshi was sexy, arrogant and commanding, especially in his white shirts. More and more, these stills prove that Joo Won just doesn’t cut it, he doesn’t have that Chiaki vibe and aura.

      • I agree, Tamaki was Chiaki but Joo Won does not have that commanding aura at all or the look.
        Sigh, I still have hope that Shim Eun Kyungs Nodame will be good…

  2. Kinda weird, but nodame looks so clean. Still can’t figure nodame character in shim eun kyung. Nodame suppose to be messy n clumsy too. Or maybe ueno juri play the character too perfect. And also for joowon can’t see chiaki character yet. But hope the drama goes well eventhough might not be as perfect as j nodame.

  3. Sek looks like a younger version of UJ but she lacks the charm that UJ had when she brought to life her character nodame. But anyways we have to see it in action to be fair.

  4. Hot man in crisp shirt XD, this is what i need.
    Joowon seriously looking good, althoughTamaki Hiroshi in white shirt still winning for me.
    I will watch this as a K drama not a remake of the Jdrama or something. If we keep comparing the two, where’s the fun? :p

  5. I dunno… SEK lacks that spark somehow, she just look earnest and endearing.
    JW has got a bit of the aloof and irritable attitude in the stills already, that’s good. I don’t expect him to be a duplicate of Tamaki Hiroshi but to me more in character as compared to SEK in the stills.

  6. When I was watching bride of the century I kept thinking I’d seen the actress. Then I realized I was thinking of Nodame. Bride of century girl may not the greatest actress but that was how I remembered the Japanese Nodame to be like.

  7. Well the wardrobe for Nodame looks promising, quirky outfits. Still she looks so clean. I hope they keep her slobness and the fact that she washed herself about once a week (I love when Chiaki is like what smells so bad and it’s turns out to be Nodame) and her flat that had molded food, cobwebs etc.
    I’m still not sure about this, I really want to like it but I’m worried that they’ll change the characters and story too much. Hopefully Nodame will be just as wacky as in the original, running around campus with Chiaki’s belt and eating people’s bentos.

    • I love the scene where Chiaki was so put off by the smell of Nodame’s unwashed head, and so horrified when she told him about her bathing routine that he immediately dunked her in the shower and began shampooing her hair, hahaha. Juri and Hiroshi were hilarious in that.

      • Haha, yeah. That’s one my favorites. His reaction, you what and then the shampoo scene.
        But another favorite scene is when she brings Stresemann to Chiaki’s house and the innuendo of taking Nodame to a hotel room with a flyffy bed and a very fluffy pillow (I was dying of laughter) and Nodame is just okay let’s go!

  8. So excited for this! I love Joo Won since Gaksital. I mean he was so good in that drama, I so love him in it! His acting is one of the best in kdramaland, I believe. I think he portrayed Lee Kang To so well that I’ll never forget that character ever. These stills are squee-inducing, goodness! I mean look at that last photo..gasp!!! Love this! Thanks for the post, Ockoala!!!

  9. Actually, I don’t really get the complaints about her looking too clean. Nodame always looked put together when she went to school. She was messy at home though. I’ll be picky and say I don’t like her bag at all. It’s a trademark and this one is ugly.

  10. They maybe really good actors but they dont seem to have that corkiness that tamaki and ueno did. I dont think this verison should ever be made :'( Like skipbeat my god….

  11. Well i’ve watched nodame cantabile for the umpteenth time and seriously i don’t understand those who comment that shim eun kyung didn’t look slobbish enough as nodame should. Well i wonder if we’re watching different j-dorama because nodame didn’t look slobbish and messy all the time. There’s even time where i thought nodame dress quite neat and cute in college. The one thing that’s definite was that nodame at home is dirty and messy but in college quite the opposite if i must say. I mean these are only the first still, give it a chance. Although i highly doubt they will be up on par with the japanese one, i’d still watch the drama without thinking too much about the comparison between the two. I mean korean never make exact clean adaptation, they always tend to mould it into quiet different piece from the original one. Just my humble opinion though~

  12. I also don’t get the too clean comment. Nodame is actually quite trendy and well put together whenever she’s outside. The only time you’ll know she’s messy and slobby is when she’s at home or when Chiaki smells her.

  13. As usual, JW’s trademark is his frowns. Whatever the scene is, he frowns most of the time. And I don’t get Chiaki vibe from him.
    I’m sure SEK is a great actress, but I don’t see Nodame there. Not because she’s too clean, but just because I don’t feel it. I still remember clearly on how Nodame stand, run, speak, play the piano, etc.
    I really don’t have to do this, but I can’t help but compare those stills of JW and SEK above with UJ and TH.
    I’m sorry for being negative, I just love the original so much.

  14. I think there is some truth in when people say that Nodame isn’t all a mess all the time either – the real slob comes out mostly at home.

    That said, there is something lacking in these pictures. The dress is a little more off-beat than the first still they released (which was just way too pretty for Nodame), but nothing in these images says anything other than “lovely rom-com heroine”. If these pictures didn’t come with a “Nodame” tag attached, would we even be able to tell it’s Nodame? I don’t really think so.

    What’s missing is the quirky-factor. Look at Nodame pictures. There’s always something a little off-beat. Sometimes it’s the messy hair. Sometimes it’s the weird clothing. Often it’s just the look that Ueno Juri has on her face and/or her more general body language, lips pressed together, eyebrows knotted, hands curled, eyes pulled into slits so that you can as if see hearts popping out of them as she adoringly stares at Chiaki.

    Shim Eun-kyung looks just sweet here. At most I can say there’s a puppy-dog look in one of the images (when she’s holding Jon Won’s hand), but that’s it. Which isn’t to say that she can’t do the offbeat or that she won’t (I think the producers would be mad not have Nodame’s quirky body-language/look in this adaptation), but I can’t understand why they’ve decided not to show it to us here, in these first (and thus very important) stills from the drama. Gimme something that, if you showed me a hundred images of Shim Eun-kyung and/or rom-com heroines, I could pick out Nodame in one second. Because that’s what you can do with the original.

    • I just don’t get it. This is a remake or adaptation, the character and storyline may change a little bit. This is a recreated version so Why do people still expecting it to be exactly like the Japanese version? They even change the character’s name..

      Those quirky body movements does not work all the time (even in jdrama) and I think slapstick acting from Nodame 2006 won’t work in 2014 so it’s ok with me if they ditch that in this remake.

  15. I really hate his hair here, it looks silly. You can’t just slap Tamaki Hiroshi’s hairstyle on a different guy and hope that it will somehow look the same. I do think that Joo Won has enough acting skills to do Chiaki justice, but image wise so far I just don’t see it. He honestly looked more like Chiaki in Gaksital than in these stills.

    • Naww, Tamaki’s Chiaki hairstyle was much much better, it made him look really hot. I thought it was a bit meh in the specials, but in the drama and movies, he was yummy.

  16. I bet Group 8 spent 90% of the drama’s budget just to get these two lead actors.

    Usually they pick handsome but newbie actors for their drama adaptations, so they probably come cheap.

    This is the first time they cast lead actors who are already very popular.

  17. It looks cute. Can’t wait to see Korean’s Take on the story. The Live Japanese Chiaki guy always looked like a university professor rather than an college student. Joo Won seems to look the part. As far as the Japanese Nodame, she is usually “clean” when in school or at least outwardly she “looked” clean. She was a slob at home and didn’t shower often, but I thought she looked “pretty” when outside of her home. I can’t wait for the K-version to come out.

  18. Excited!! I’ve seen japanese and anime version and I’m looking forward for the Korean version. Since this is an adaptation, I know that this is going to be different to the jdrama version. Not gonna worry about the actor (since they’re good) but rather the storyline progresses.

  19. Those who commented that SEK looks too sweet in these stills need to watch Miss Granny and Sunny ASAP! You will chang your mind the very first frame SEK appears on screen. She IS Nodame in those roles. The facial expressions, gestures, mannerisms, way of speaking, this girl acts with her whole body and its joyful to watch.

    All im concerned about is the writing, because these 2, theyre as good as Korea can get to embody Chiaki and Nodame.

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