The casting gods have spoken and it is indeed happening that very very tall K-actor Yoon Kyun Sang will be joining very very petite actress Kim Yoo Jung in the upcoming webtoon adapted drama Clean with Passion for Now. The age gap thingie with the teen actresses with their male leads has been an issue for a few years now but visually I’m more weirded out by how Yoon Kyun Sang will loom large over Kim Yoo Jung in scenes. I love how dominating he was in Pinocchio, the perfect hyung who was both security and menace wrapped into one. But as the male lead with a fear of germs, I just see him as this lunkhead lurching around while Kim Yoo Jung flits beside him being plucky. Hopefully I’ll be proven wrong as filming has resumed for the drama with the PD of Personal Taste and Who Are You. An airing date on cable channel jTBC hasn’t been set yet but I expect sometime in the fall.
This is the clunkiest casting ever…
I’m all for tall dude and petite girl, but KYJ still looks like a lil kid in my eyes.. lols..
she’s gonna have to stand on a lot of boxes
her webtoon character is very petite. She does not need to pretend… LOL…
and oh, I must say the male lead character in the webtoon is very very tall, so the height difference is actually intentional. BTW, YKS is very tall, but he is also a bit chubby, I mean chubbier than the webtoon character…. I wonder if he has time to slim down?
This will test how good of an actress and how ready KYJ is for adult role. I did not realized that she is still a teenager and yet will be playing a more mature role. Recently, I noticed is looking more mature than a teenager.
Her counterpart Kim So Hyun has able to breakthroough from being a child actress to an adult actress in Radio Romance.
I don’t think Radio Romance was good enough to help Kim So Hyun shed off the child actress image. She sometimes looked like a kid playing a grown up.
KSH’s performance as a radio writer was lacking in few aspects. Nevertheless, it’s a good break for her in transitioning into adult role from being a child actress.
I think it’s the same challenge for KYJ here. Would she be able to give justice to the character considering she is actually alot younger than the character she’s be playing?
@MistyEyes Yoojung’s character in the webtoon is 20-21 years old (presumably Korean age), around the same age as her in real life.
If you look at it by numbers well yes. But being a teen and on 20s have huge difference in actual human make up whether psychologically and by life experience.
Unlike YKS who would be playing a CEO of a company and SJR roles, their roles are much nearer to their life experience.
Yoojung is 20 (Korean age, 18 international) so exactly the same age as the character. I think Gil Ohsol is supposed to be in college since they cast someone to play her sunbae. Anyway she’s definitely not much younger than the character she’s playing, maturity-wise.
It’s not the webtoon though but only an adaptation of that.
According to the drama synosis,Gil Oh Sol is a CEO of a cleaning company. Though we don’t know how old he’s going to be in the drama.
I think I have already explained that being teen and adult are two different in life whether it’s 2 or 3 years age gap. At this stage of life, 3yrs mean a lot of difference in persons maturity.
Having said that, KYJ was good as a child actress. I think she can pull it off as she transition into doing adult roles from this drama onwards.
Gil Ohsol is Yoojung’s character, the heroine. Jang Sunkyul is the CEO love interest.
It was a very strong performance and received rave reviews from everyone. She’s completely transitioned from child to adult in the eyes of Korea.
But KYJ’s character (20-21) here is close to her actual age (18 intl age), so I don’t think she’s in a rush to go for “mature” roles (trying to be mid to late 20s). Its just that production staff got YKS (30s), hence there is an incorrect assumption that YJ is going for mature characters, when in fact she seems to be cognisant of trying not to rush her transition as character that she choice is still closer to her present situation (age-wise, sneakers-trainers kind of character).
As for the height, its align with the webtoon characters that she can barely reach his shoulders. Age-wise, I’ve already done my fair share of venting, so I can just hope for a “sweeter” version of the romance in order not to be totally weirded out.
YKS/agencies/production team, were fully aware of the sentiments, but went ahead, so I hope they can prove as wrong.
Yoon Kyun Sang’s role is a CEO of a cleaning company according to the drama synopsis. I assume that the character must be around 27 or 28 years which just around YKS real age.
Kim Yoo Jung’s role is an employee of a company. If she has an office job in the drama then she must around 22-23 year. An entry-level employee in Korea is around that age.
KYJ play character her age while KSH play a character 5,8 years older than her age. Radio Romance wasnt a hit, so it was a breakthrough.
I actually think its the other way around. KYJ (thanks to the unexpected success of Moonlight) was able to strengthen her female lead status. She seems to have more pull or weight, hence we’ve heard more female lead offers going her way (but she has turned down), and even for this drama to postpone the shooting temporarily and wait for her is a big deal- business-wise. Though, her realistic challenge esp for this project is if she can carry a bit more, since there seems to be more expectatiin on her to lead the project since she’s been associated with this drama the longest.
I completely disagree about KSH’s performance in Radio Romance. In fact, I think it’s one of her worst to date and it shows that she’s not ready for adult roles yet. Her performance is so cringy because you can clearly see its’s just a kid pretending to be an adult by doing adult stuffs without any naturalness and nuances.
KSH performance was brilliant but a hater like you would never understand. KYJ has almost always been underwhelming even as a child actor which is why even a rookie actor chose to not act with her. He could have waited like SJR but he knew he has better opportunity by backing out just like YSJ did,
YKS doesn’t have the look of a typical webtoon character and he’s older than the character. I’m surprised they chose him even if I like him as an actor.
I was actually surprise that YKS took the offer considering how publicly known the process of getting the male lead was. Usual casting sequence is from established lead actors to now promoted supporting leads to main/breakout stars to rookies/idols.
I have to say that I think KYJ deserves a good actor as partner but in the same time this drama could have been the perfect opportunity for an idol male to turn actor because they have the look. Now that I know it will be YKS, I think an idol could have done it too…
Full Disclosure:
When AHS was chosen as male lead- Why a rookie lead?
When AHS stepped down, and before YKS was associated with this drama- Rookie actor closer in age but NO idol-actor
When they offered it to YKS- there are alot of young and tall rookie actors, why YKS?
But i’ve come to distance myself my drama-watching-self from the age thing and decided to just give the drama a chance.
I don’t care about the difference of age. If the actors agreed to do it, why I would care ? For me it’s just important that they can pull off their character. In this case, I think YKS looks older than the original character and has more a teddy bear vibe than a CEO. In Cheese in the Trap, I thought that Park Hae Jin looked too old for this role by example.
But I will watch the drama and I really hope that he will me make wrong and the drama will be good because I like the both actors.
I read a translation of the official announcement of Yoon Kyunsang’s casting saying this drama is supposed to give off a “youthful” vibe or something like that. *sigh*
Oh well. I’ll the first few episodes since I love Yoojung, and I do like Kyunsang. I’ll drop it if I’m squicked out once the romance kicks in.
Jeez both guys are too old for her. We need a suspension of disbelief to become convinced they are a couple. It’s quite a turn off actually.
So disappointed.. But who knows maybe they’ll be convincing enough to pull it off
I’m so disappointed that they werent able to find an actor who’s close to her age like Jisoo, Sung-Jae.. He looks like her brother eh, (anyways, hopefully when the drama starts they’ll create that chemistry despite the big age gap)
Are we running out of teen male actors or what? This trend of pairing barely legal actress with much older actor is disturbing. My interest in this drama suddenly takes a nose dive after this casting. Sorry Yoojung baby but I might drop this one.
agree
I would say it would be a hilarious drama dont worry on aged he still a baby face … lets look on the acting side of the both actors it might have some changes on the story… JTBC believe on them.. I will wait and see on these..
I completely agree with you! 😀 Can’t wait for this drama to air!