Korea’s Own Soonyoung Han -The Casting Extraordinaire
Everybody who watched the 2020 Academy Awards show on TV knows that South Korea is a country to be reckoned with on an artistic level. The movie Parasite, written and directed by the South Korean filmmaker Boon Joon-ho, won the Oscar for Best Picture. It also won golden statuettes for Best Director, Best Original Screenplay and Best International Film. It wasn’t surprising that Parasite won those Oscars, what surprised a great deal of movie buffs is that this South Korean film won for Best Picture and Best International Film. This was the first time in the Academy’s history that a foreign language movie won for Best Picture. Many felt that that honor was strictly reserved for American films only.
Well, the South Koreans showed us, and they showed the world that talent and excellence can be found beyond borders and that wherever they exist they should be recognized as such. Soonyoung Han, the South Korean casting director, understands the importance of Korean films and raising the status of them. Soonyoung Han recently attended an actors’ workshop in Seoul led by actor and acting coach Richie Chance and Cheryl Murphy who is a global casting agent and also an agent for Spectrum Talent in Los Angeles, California. It was a five-day workshop that culminated in an industry showcase where students demonstrated their exceptional acting abilities.
The attendees worked with a group of Korean-based actors over the course of 8 workshops. They learned a wide range of acting techniques and business skills that will help successfully propel them on their journey toward becoming outstanding actors in the entertainment industry. Soonyoung Han told us that Richie is passionate about acting and that he thrives on coaching actors to be the very best they can be. He helps them find the raw, untapped talent within themselves that they can authentically and artfully apply to their craft.
South Korea is already a huge success in the business world and it has in just a few short decades transformed itself into a major industrial nation that among many other things, it can boast that it is the planet’s third largest manufacturer of automobiles. Soonyoung Han feels that it is certainly time groom a metropolis like Seoul into the next big thing in cinema. Soonyoung Han also feels that this actors’ workshop was highly successful and the students were given practical methods to improve upon along with a basic understanding of the Hollywood system that some of them may enter in the future. In the future, Soonyoung Han would like to bring more American acting coaches and casting directors to Korea to give Korean actors even more opportunities.
