'She's taken to him already.'
Ra Ju-hyun smiled faintly.
As if to prove they are mother and daughter, the pair of them are staring at the television as though they will be sucked into it.
'A-rin is one thing, but Ji-yun there went and watched him on set and she is still like this.'
Min Ji-yun has her knees gathered up against her body and her neck craned forward.
She is so far gone that someone could carry her off and she would not notice. In a way it makes sense.
Acting seen on set and acting seen in the cut are different things.
The magic of the edit; directors are not called image technicians for nothing.
They add dramatic staging even to ordinary scenes that amount to nothing.
And when that magic is added to Seo Gang-woo's looks? The strongest possible combination is born.
The camera lights Seo Gang-woo's face relentlessly.
A bust shot showing him down past the shoulders, and Seo Gang-woo, headphones on, creases his face.
The person watching cannot help copying that expression.
Because simply looking at him drives the despair of that abandoned child down into the bone.
Seo Gang-woo puts the headphones on.
The music stops in an instant. A few seconds of silence, and then the scene changed.
That was when Im A-rin came back to herself.
"You asked how he'd be as the child actor?"
"Yes. What do you think."
"He's good. Far too good, but the film isn't confirmed for production, so it isn't a thing I can say yes to."
"Really? The investors aren't coming together?"
Ra Ju-hyun asked in a puzzled voice.
Not because she is her daughter, but because actress Im A-rin's ticket power is recognised as considerable even inside the industry.
, which Im A-rin appeared in last year, alone drew five million admissions.
Even the networks named an unprecedented price to book a woman who only makes films.
That attempt failed in the end, but as soon as the price the industry had named got out, word went around that top stars were all trying to push their own fees up.
Im A-rin shook her head.
"No. Actually, it's more than two years since the director offered me the part. I turned it down all that time because my schedule was busy."
"Bring it up again. It's a chance for his own baby to see daylight, so the director will be glad."
Im A-rin nodded. Then she said to Min Ji-yun.
"If it was going to come to this I should have looked at Gang-woo's face on set that time. Shouldn't I."
"I said we should! Mom, Mom, so does that mean we're going to meet Gang-woo? Shall I call Gang-woo?"
"No, not now, let's do it later."
Later, later.
Seo Gang-woo does it too, and Im A-rin keeps putting the arrangement off.
Min Ji-yun blew both cheeks out full of air and said as if sulking.
"......It's always later."
"It's because Mom has something to check first."
Even work has an order to it, doesn't it.
Im A-rin had already settled on casting Seo Gang-woo.
What remains is persuading the director and the actor himself.
Min Ji-yun seemed to sense intuitively that it was about the film, and beamed.
Seo Gang-woo is going to be in the same film as her mother.
What that meant was simple.
More chances to see Seo Gang-woo under cover of seeing her mother. Min Ji-yun said with a broad smile.
The smile of an artless child surfaced.
"Then Mom, can I come and hang around that set?"
***
The next day, Im A-rin headed for Cheongdam.
Her outfit today is light. Apart from a mask and a hat, there is exactly one accessory on her face.
Orange sunglasses, a white two-piece. In Cheongdam this sort of fashion is fine. Because you trip over celebrities in the street.
Only a moment ago she ran into an actor she knew. Two of them, in fact.
'But director Kim really is a stubborn stick of a man.'
A brunch cafe with a terrace, and a man who feels out of place against Cheongdam's mood sits at an outdoor table taking in the sun.
A man in his forties in a beanie and round glasses.
Dark with stubble, he has his hands in his pockets and his neck tipped back as if he had sunk into a sauna's hot bath. It is a little like looking at a drowsy sloth.
Im A-rin threw a hand up and made herself known.
"Director!"
It was director Kim Jae-gu, who two years ago drew 1.6 million admissions with .
He stretched and returned Im A-rin's greeting.
"You're here."
"Yes. Have you been well?"
"Me, well, I live because I can't manage to die."
Kim Jae-gu is not a man with commercial pull where the general public is concerned.
Apart from his last work he has never turned in a distinct result.
But he is famous as a man who makes varied attempts by genre.
His last work was science fiction, a genre considered barren ground in Korea.
1.6 million on science fiction; on that alone the film world is watching him.
Im A-rin said with a bright smile.
"You haven't changed. The last time we saw each other was last winter, wasn't it?"
"Yes. At director Park Ju-seong's after-party. What brings you?"
Im A-rin took a bound script out of her handbag.
A white title showed against a black cover.
.
Kim Jae-gu's eyebrows twitched. Because an object he had not expected had come out.
"You still had this?"
It is the script he sent through Im A-rin's agency two years ago. It has been over a year since the last time he offered her the part.
So it has in fact been a long time since he himself saw a physical copy of it.
'Did I bury this script in storage. Ah, I put it in a moving box and never unpacked it.'
Kim Jae-gu looked at the script the way one looks at a stillborn child. Im A-rin said.
"I only thought about it all this time, because I was busy. You haven't found some other actress instead of me, have you?"
"No, no. As if I would."
Kim Jae-gu straightened his posture. This is a project that broke apart in mid-air at the casting stage, never mind production.
The actor who had responded positively has come to find him. Nothing could be better than this.
'......And Im A-rin, no less!'
Industry people will respond positively to investment on the strength of those three syllables alone.
Kim Jae-gu grinned without hiding his delight.
"We'll have to assemble a team. You're thinking of doing it, then?"
"Yes. The sooner the better, I think."
"But didn't you say you were resting? That acting without a break had left you feeling as though your sense of yourself had shrivelled up......"
"I was thinking of taking a sabbatical."
Im A-rin chose her words for a moment and raised her eyes.
A fine smile sat at the corner of her mouth.
"I changed my mind."
"All of a sudden?"
"There's a child actor in your piece, isn't there. As a supporting role."
"Ah, yes. The child."
is a mystery thriller.
A friend's death, and the heroine, a reporter, heads for a country village to look after her friend's son for a while.
The son's role matters here.
Because he serves as the key by which the protagonist digs out the whole truth of a murder.
The sole witness to a murder committed in a country village, and on top of that a considerably demanding condition is attached.
'......Mute.'
The character cannot speak.
The child actor has to express complicated emotion through his eyes and his body, with no dialogue.
Which is why this part may in fact be harder to act than the heroine.
And in reality there was great difficulty in finding a child for it.
'There was one actor who expressed a wish to do it.'
Lee Yu-chan, sixteen years old, is currently drawing great popularity in a well-known sitcom.
Kim Jae-gu sank into thought for a moment.
'But that sitcom...... I think they said it ends soon......'
Isn't it nearly at its close? Kim Jae-gu tilted his head.
Im A-rin said.
"There's a child actor I'd like to recommend."
"Who is that?"
"Seo Gang-woo. He's the child actor in the KBC Monday-Tuesday drama at the moment. , have you seen it?"
Seo Gang-woo. The instant he heard the name, Kim Jae-gu's expression shifted subtly.
It was a name he already knew.
"Ah, that child actor. I know him too."
He is a child actor who has lately become a talking point among industry people. Drama, advertising, film — the name comes up often enough.
'Every time I go out drinking, Seo Gang-woo comes up.'
At first he wondered what all the fuss over a child actor could be about.
Later, feeling as though a callus was forming on his ear, he made time to search him.
Going by the face alone, he had no choice but to nod.
For an industry man to know that face and leave it lying there is dereliction of duty.
'But was he good at acting too?'
Kim Jae-gu had not seen yesterday's broadcast. If Im A-rin is reacting like this there must be something beyond the looks......
Having ordered his thoughts, Kim Jae-gu said.
"There are a few things that concern me."
"Concerns?"
"Honestly, the data is a bit thin. This drama appearance is all of it?"
"Yes. It's his debut work."
"I wanted a child actor with camera experience. As you know, the part is hardly an easy one."
Kim Jae-gu tapped the table with a finger and went on.
"I don't know whether he can bring out the character I want."
Im A-rin only smiled without speaking. She said.
"And the next thing you're worried about?"
"You'll laugh when you hear it......"
"I won't laugh."
"He's too handsome."
Kim Jae-gu, who had said it himself, laughed as if he found it absurd.
The more handsome an actor, the better. Looks are a measure of box office.
Only when the audience comes does the film's message get read.
In that light Seo Gang-woo could be an enormous relief pitcher for a great many directors.
Because a fair number of people would come simply to look at that face.
Im A-rin asked as if the answer were unexpected.
"......Being handsome is a problem?"
"I wonder whether attention won't go to that child's face rather than to the flow of the film."
A famous Hollywood actor said as much.
That he deliberately put on weight because people were not watching his acting, only his face.
If the child actor is too handsome, the focus that should go to the heroine is scattered.
Will the audience be able to follow the story?
Kim Jae-gu shook his head side to side.
With the child actor's ability unverified, he could not settle a casting on looks alone.
Kim Jae-gu let out a sigh. His shoulders sagged a little.
"Well...... if you want him, of course I'll use him. Only, I'd like to see him act, that's my point."
"Good timing, as it happens. The child's episode aired yesterday."
"Did it? Can I watch it now?"
"Yes. Do as you like."
Kim Jae-gu brightened.
He took a laptop out of his backpack and went to the network's homepage. The clicking went on.
KBC, catch-up service, .
"He'll come on at about twelve minutes."
"Twelve minutes, twelve minutes. You memorised it?"
"Yes. I found the acting striking myself. The next stretch is at nineteen minutes."
She memorised another actor's timings?
At Im A-rin's reaction Kim Jae-gu's expectation grew larger.
Kim Jae-gu stopped clicking the mouse.
Seo Gang-woo's acting unfolded, and he moved his hand from the mouse to the arrow keys.
Rewind, rewind, rewind, rewind.
Im A-rin smiled brightly. She said.
"Well? Worth recommending, isn't he?"
"......Do you have his contact details?"
Worth recommending?
He wanted to ask why on earth she had not come sooner.
Kim Jae-gu looked at Im A-rin with impatient eyes.
He had to call at once. Because too late and there would not even be a chance.