Direct interview about the most popular artist who debut as an actor in a movie, Choi Seunghyun aka T.O.P from Big Bang
Not only T.O.P is in a great and popular group Big Bang, but he also challenged to be an actor, Choi Seunghyun. His first movie was made in public with no problems. Different from seeing him as an artist, we will report his new side to you directly.
After watching the movie, we hope to catch the current happiness. Now, of course in both Korea and Japan, Big Bang’s T.O.P. is known as a rapper and Choi Seunghyun as an actor. His first movie, “71: Into The Fire”, was awarded at the Korean Academy Awards, and he was awarded to be the Best Rookie Actor at the Blue Dragon Film Awards. The movie, “71: Into The Fire”, is a human drama based on a real story about student soldiers, who were inspired by their mothers’ letters which happened during the Korean War.
Q: Getting high reputation in the drama, “IRIS”, why does Seunghyun wanted to debut in a movie?
TOP: In fact, when I tried to do my screen debut, I had many candidate scripts to choose. This script is so special. This is the most emotional one amongst the other scripts I had read and I thought it was worth challenging for me since I was in the generation who knew little about the Korean War. That’s why I chose this. The generation, who knew little about the war, will feel happy living in such a peaceful era and want to catch today’s happiness when watching it. I think that if I, who is in the generation that knows little about the war, play a role in the movie, may attract people who has the same feeling, come to watch it. We treat the military service as our duty. That’s no doubt. So does the time when Jaebeom lived. If the war happened now, maybe I would go to the war front like him. Of course it is best that it won’t happen.
Q: When he played as JaeBeom, he exhausted and researched the information about the war. Therefore, he understood the war and the military service deeply.
TOP: Although I have already knew some information about the Korea War from my parents and grandparents, after researching, I got to know how painful the war was. When I decided to play the movie, what I knew about the Korean War is all from the textbooks. In order to challenge it better, I tried my best to search the information to expand my awareness of the war before started shooting. Otherwise, I could not do this. Through this, I learnt much about the cruel facts. I can’t even imagine how this 17-year-old guy could go through this. The picture of those student solders is the reason why I can act the boy successfully. Though they look so young in the picture, we can see them with deep thoughts….Let people think they are mature. They are so different from when I was a 17 year old. Their expressions infected me and finally, I can act JaeBeom well. Since it is hard to imagine being someone different from me, that was the hardest part of my work.
Q: To act as JaeBeom, his experience is not the all-above. This time, they shot the most intense war scenes.
TOP: There weren’t that much NGs because we wanted to make it look like the real battle. From there, I can see the skillful acting from my seniors. Previously, I have worked with the seniors and was moved by Kwon Sang Woo. Not only his acting, but also his private life. He called his family frequently. His emphasis on family values makes me feel he is the “perfect male”. And I have come to think that “marriage is not bad” for the first time. (laugh) Previously, I didn’t think about marriage. I felt it was strange. It’s necessary to have a girlfriend now, but I want to do a lot of things before getting married. Eh, having a late marriage may be also good. (laugh)
Magazine scanned by: verdad @ DCTOP
Translated by: Didikuro @ 21bangs.com
