The first day of filming had arrived.
Filming took place at a set prepared in Ilsan.
“Please change into these clothes.”
I changed into the clothes the assistant director had given me.
They were a plain gray T-shirt and black pants.
The filming team had prepared them because fake blood would be splattered on me.
The first scene to be shot was the one where Baek Seongchan kills Lee Jinhwan.
It was content that would be revealed in the final episode, but Lee Jinhwan’s moment of death was scheduled to be shown from the first episode.
That is, while hiding the killer’s face.
Since they were already filming the murder scene, they decided to shoot the scenes before and after it in sequence as well.
I was getting simple makeup done in the waiting room when Jeong Hwansik approached.
“You came early.”
“Senior, you’re here? I had a lot to prepare in advance, so I came a bit early.”
“Did you take a taxi?”
“I drove.”
I had decided to borrow my father’s car for the time being.
There was a separate company car for commuting, so it was a compact car that had only been used occasionally for short trips to nearby places.
The original Kang Hajun had a paper driver’s license, so he never drove at all.
Since there had been no need for a personal car while going to the
Jeong Hwansik showed a look of pity.
“I told you to ride with me. How hard is it to drive yourself after acting all day? I’ve done it all, so I know. If you waste your strength while you’re young, you’ll suffer later. From next time, come to our company office and leave with my manager.”
“Thank you for saying that, but I have too much luggage.”
I refused indirectly.
It was both an excuse and the truth.
Among the sponsored costumes for the drama, there were no plain clothes that would suit the character Baek Seongchan.
There was no way he would have personal sponsorship deals, so I had packed all of my own clothes, and of course, I had to manage them myself.
It would have been too much to get a ride in someone else’s car with all that luggage.
Above all, our schedules were different, so there would definitely be times when I would have to be mindful of him.
And it wasn’t just anyone—it was Jeong Hwansik—so there was nothing good about owing him a favor.
It would be hard at first while I adjusted, but it would gradually get better.
To manage my stamina whenever I could, I had also signed up for a gym.
After finishing my makeup, I went to the main set with Jeong Hwansik.
It was a place decorated as the detached house where Lee Jinhwan lived in the drama.
Seong Sihyeon, Im Changseop, and two other supporting actors had already finished preparing and were waiting.
“Shall we give it a go if everyone’s ready?”
PD Min Useok, who had been sitting in a chair, stood up and clapped sharply.
The day of Lee Jinhwan’s death.
A total of five people visited his house.
The agency CEO, his manager, a fellow actor, his father, and Baek Seongchan.
Among them, the person who arrived last was Baek Seongchan, and the person who reported the crime was also Baek Seongchan.
First, they filmed the scenes where the four people other than Baek Seongchan visited Lee Jinhwan’s house in turn.
The agency CEO, who had been at odds with Lee Jinhwan over his desire to retire from the entertainment industry.
The manager on the verge of taking the fall.
The fellow actor trembling after being caught dealing drugs.
The father who had squandered his son’s fortune on gambling and been slapped with a lawsuit.
Characters with different stories each pressured Lee Jinhwan.
“This makes the effort we put into casting worthwhile. Don’t you think so, Hajun?”
Writer Woo Yeongyeong whispered.
She had not come as the script supervisor today.
She had been so excited for the first day of filming that she couldn’t focus on finishing the script, so she had deliberately cleared her schedule.
“It does.”
I replied.
It wasn’t empty words.
I was genuinely impressed.
It was definitely a scene where everyone was arguing.
Yet not a single person got angry in the same way.
That meant they had thoroughly analyzed not only their own characters but also the characters played by others.
They showed much more mature acting than they had during the full script reading.
In particular, the two actors playing the fellow actor and the father were practically dominating the screen.
It was merely that their public recognition was low; they were all veterans with extensive acting experience.
“Why is everyone doing this to me? Why on earth…… What did I do so wrong!”
After the four people took turns ransacking the house and leaving,
Seong Sihyeon, left alone, sat on the sofa and wailed.
“Cut. Okay. Next, Baek Seongchan will enter.”
PD Min Useok signaled.
Now it was my turn.
A strange glint flashed across the pupils of Seong Sihyeon, who had been maintaining his own pace the entire time.
It lasted only a brief instant.
“Why is the house like this? Did something happen?”
Kang Hajun’s tone was calm, ill-fitting for the line.
As though he had no real interest in what had happened.
“Seongchan-ah.”
Seong Sihyeon, who had been covering his face with both hands, wiped his face dry.
In that moment, he was overcome with greed.
‘I want to stand out.’
Rising from the sofa, Seong Sihyeon slowly walked toward Kang Hajun.
He wore an expression that looked as if he might burst into tears like a child at any moment.
‘(Indifferently)’
It was different from the original stage direction.
“Rather, if there had been nothing at all from the start…… wouldn’t that have been okay?”
Seong Sihyeon forcibly swallowed his sobs.
“PD-nim, that’s—”
“Let’s see it for now.”
PD Min Useok stopped Writer Woo Yeongyeong, who had been about to point out the emotional state that differed from the script.
The two actors continued.
“Did Father come and leave again?”
Kang Hajun did not waver in the slightest.
Seong Sihyeon felt pleased by that.
There was no reaction to the other person’s ad-lib.
That meant he couldn’t find a way to respond.
But he soon realized that it was his misunderstanding.
“If only, like you, I had held nothing in my hands……”
“So what if I had?”
Kang Hajun’s gaze changed completely.
Seong Sihyeon felt a chill.
At that moment, the initiative driving the scene passed to Kang Hajun.
“Then I would have been happy. Because I’d have had nothing to lose.”
“Having something to lose is happiness in itself.”
Seong Sihyeon clearly felt the barbs hidden within Kang Hajun’s indifferent tone.
He turned around according to the movement they had agreed upon earlier.
Because he had to be ambushed by Kang Hajun, further ad-libbing was impossible.
“You don’t know. The misfortune of those who have.”
Seong Sihyeon said.
Kang Hajun’s breathing gradually quickened, and his eyes began to redden.
Looking around, he picked up a large decorative stone rolling around the living room floor.
And he struck the back of Seong Sihyeon’s head.
“You don’t know. The misfortune of those who have nothing.”
Kang Hajun’s voice trembled thinly as he looked down at the collapsed Seong Sihyeon and muttered.
“Have you ever had nothing?”
That soon turned to despair.
“Have you ever been miserable coveting what belongs to others!?”
And then to madness.
“Okay! Let’s go once more with blood makeup.”
A smile hung at the corners of PD Min Useok’s mouth.
“Did the two of you plan that in advance?”
Writer Woo Yeongyeong was no different.
“Anyway, you have to acknowledge Kang Hajun’s ability to bring a scene to life.”
“They say the loan shark character in
“That’s right. Honestly, I was going to play it calmly on purpose because I thought acting that agitated might overlap with the loan shark image. Killing someone quietly somehow seemed like it could be more chilling. But doing it like that just now definitely has more impact.”
“It doesn’t even look particularly similar to the loan shark character. The backstories of the two characters are clearly different.”
Lying in place as blood makeup was applied, Seong Sihyeon pricked up both ears.
He wanted to hear the conversation between the PD and the writer.
‘Damn it.’
He forcibly suppressed the urge to grab his own head and bit his lower lip hard.
“It feels strange, right? Everyone is like that at first. It won’t stick yet, so don’t worry too much.”
The makeup team, misunderstanding his expression, said.
“Haha, yes.”
Seong Sihyeon smiled meaninglessly and soon straightened his face.
‘I was swayed. Me.’
It was nothing short of humiliating.
He ground his teeth as he thought of Kang Hajun getting makeup applied behind him.
The filming of that scene continued for another half a day.
It wasn’t that there were particularly many NGs.
It was simply that PD Min Useok was being greedy with the directing.
‘Quite a cool scene will come out of this.’
Recalling the shots he would need to edit in his head, he quickly jotted them down in the empty spaces of the script.
They were shots so essential that blood tears wouldn’t be enough if he forgot them without taking notes.
**
“Team Leader Oh. Did you look into what I asked?”
“What was that? ……Ah, Gang Hajun, the lead of ?”
Jeong Hwansik was returning home early in the evening after finishing his own filming for the day.
He fired the question at his manager, who was concentrating on driving.
The manager answered.
“He doesn’t seem like a parachute. And he’s good at acting.”
“Does he not seem like one, or is he not one?”
“He’s not. There’s a rumor that Gang Hajun pushed out Seong Sihyeon, who had been about to parachute into the lead role, with nothing but skill.”
Jeong Hwansik was confused about whether to believe that.
Was it realistically possible to beat a parachute with backing using nothing but skill?
“Is there nothing certain besides rumors?”
“Hyung. Rumors are ninety percent fact. There’s no smoke without fire. Only about ten percent are nonsense spread maliciously out of jealousy. But logically, who would spread good rumors maliciously?”
The manager, who had been talking excitedly, shrugged his shoulders.
“Decisively, it’s straight from the main writer! She said so on the full script reading day. That she was inspired to write the script after watching Gang Hajun act in
“Ugh, I don’t know!”
Jeong Hwansik pressed his forehead and grew irritable.
He had a headache.
If the man truly wasn’t a parachute, that was a small relief.
If he had both skill and solid backing, that would truly be absurd.
“Did you try contacting the movie company again?”
“Hyung. As a person, that’s a bit…… They say you tried to pull rank even though you’re not the boss. Why did you do that? These days, even top-tier leads don’t act like that. They seemed completely livid.”
“Ah, so I’m telling you to appease them!”
“Jeez, that damn light always catches us!”
The manager, stepping on the brake, tapped the steering wheel and subtly expressed his annoyance.
It wasn’t the traffic light; it was Jeong Hwansik’s hysteria.
“Haah.”
Jeong Hwansik let out a deep sigh.
His mind was full of nothing but Gang Hajun.
If the man truly had no backing, messing with a mere rookie actor would be nothing.
However, the fact that he was the ‘protagonist’ weighed on his mind.
If the protagonist ran into trouble, it would disrupt the drama, and then all the people entangled with it would suffer in succession.
Of course, Jeong Hwansik himself was included among ‘all those people.’
‘How can I pull that greenhorn junior off the express train?’
As Jeong Hwansik brooded, a brilliant idea flashed through his mind.
‘The drama production articles haven’t even come out yet, have they? What if I replace the protagonist before promotion starts?’
Snap—
He flicked his fingers.
“Team Leader Oh. You said Seong Sihyeon’s uncle is the broadcasting station president who greenlit the drama’s time slot, right?”
“Yes. Why do you ask?”
“No reason.”
Jeong Hwansik smiled a triumphant smile.
Because Gang Hajun’s express train would soon derail from its course.