Chapter 179: Ambiguity Aversion
“Sunho! WAX Channel wants a meeting! It’s about appearing on Mystery Singer, the one they produce!”
...Oh?
The answer came faster than I had expected.
I had half believed and half doubted that Flash Entertainment would actually pull it off, even while secretly hoping they would.
But in the end, they had done it.
I did not know how they had managed to shake a high-and-mighty American broadcasting network, but arranging the meeting alone was already an impressive result.
What comes after that is my territory.
Now I just had to take the baton and lock in the appearance myself.
“As it happens, I’m already in America right now. Good timing.”
“Really? That’s perfect. Then I’ll set the meeting schedule right away!”
I ended the call in high spirits and stepped out of the arrivals hall.
First, I had to deal with the reason I had come to LA in the first place.
I moved quickly to look for a place to stay while I was active in Hollywood.
Between filming the movie and appearing on the program, it looked like I would be staying for quite a long time.
I could not keep drifting from hotel to hotel.
I had studied local real estate fairly diligently before coming, but theory and practice were different, so I brought along a self-proclaimed expert.
“Why did you come out so late? A CEO’s time is gold.”
“My suitcase came out late. Sorry.”
I climbed into the passenger seat of the car Han Seungwoo had driven over.
Then we immediately started touring different properties.
“This house doesn’t get enough sunlight. If it’s not south-facing, people get depressed. Pass.”
“This area looks a little sketchy. You’d hear gunshots at night. Pass.”
“The view here isn’t bad, but the location is awkward. Pass.”
Apparently, he had not been bluffing when he called himself an expert.
He kept scrutinizing every place and picking out the flaws.
...I’m really grateful, but...
At this rate, there was no way I could actually choose a place.
This was already the tenth place he had rejected.
“This won’t do. Follow me.”
Han Seungwoo clicked his tongue at me, then said he knew of a house and drove me there.
What we arrived at was a modern two-story house with a spacious garden and a swimming pool.
It was definitely much better than all the houses we had seen so far.
But...
Isn’t this a little too good?
It was not as though I would be living in America permanently.
And I would be living alone.
The house was too large and too luxurious.
“What do you think?”
“...It’s nice. Too nice, actually.”
“Thought so, right? But this house already has an owner.”
“......?”
Then why bring me here?
When I looked at Han Seungwoo in disbelief, he smirked and jingled a ring of keys.
“That owner is me.”
“......!”
Han Seungwoo tossed the keys at me.
“It’s a vacation house I bought as a kind of escape retreat, but as you know, I’m the CEO now, so I’m busy. I won’t be coming here for a while, and it’d be a waste to let it sit, so just stay here if you can.”
...Seriously?
I was grateful, but wasn’t this a bit too much generosity?
“Should I pay rent?”
“Do I look like a beggar to you? Just pay the maintenance fees.”
“...Why?”
At my involuntary question, Han Seungwoo answered while twirling a finger.
“I’m not the kind of person who can live with a debt hanging over me.”
“......A debt?”
When I gave him a puzzled look, Han Seungwoo pointed at the fountain pen tucked into his chest pocket.
“You came to my inauguration ceremony and saved my face, so I should at least do this much.”
Then he checked the time, gave me a casual wave, and got back into the car.
“Don’t do drugs, don’t throw wild parties, don’t gamble. Keep the place clean. I’ll come inspect it later.”
A few days later, in the heart of Manhattan, New York, amid the dense forest of skyscrapers, an enormous glass building stood with imposing grandeur.
It was the headquarters of WAX Channel, the giant cable network that broadcast across the United States.
I got a visitor pass in the lobby.
...It’s been quite a while since I had to wear a visitor badge to enter a broadcasting station.
It struck me again.
Here, I was thoroughly an outsider, a challenger who had to be tested.
“Mr. Ryu Sunho? This way, please.”
I followed the staff guide down a long corridor.
On both sides of the hallway, I could hear staff bustling about and phones ringing nonstop.
It was exactly the sort of atmosphere you would expect from a major network competing for first and second place in the American ratings.
The place I was guided to was a large conference room.
The employee who had brought me there stepped out, asking me to wait a moment, and I slowly looked around the room I had been left in alone.
The first thing that caught my eye was one wall completely covered in profile photos and Post-it notes.
...That’s incredible.
There had to be well over a hundred of them pasted there.
Quite a few were faces I recognized by name.
Click—
At that moment, the conference room door opened.
Three or four members of the production team, including the executive producer, entered.
There was a mix of curiosity and fatigue in their eyes.
“It’s nice to meet you.”
A white-haired man adjusted his glasses and spoke.
“I watched the video. I learned about you thanks to Mr. Park, and I found it very impressive.”
Mr. Park?
I quickly searched through the PDs with the surname Park in my head, and the answer came almost immediately.
Do they mean Park Jaehong PD?
If it was Park Jaehong PD, he was currently the main PD directing Mystery Singer at MBS and also the original creator of the format.
Ah.
Only now did the puzzle begin to fit together in my head.
Most likely, Park Jaehong PD had joined as a key advisor and built a relationship of trust with this production team.
If that was the case—
CEO Hwang Cheoljun must have dug into that connection relentlessly.
My thoughts clearing, I smiled with ease.
“Thank you.”
Once I roughly understood the cause-and-effect chain, I could more or less see how this opportunity had reached me.
The American version of Mystery Singer had kept achieving consecutive success as the seasons went on.
As the production team prepared the next season, they would have put tremendous effort into selecting participants in order to maintain that buzz.
But there were countless things they had to worry about.
They had to satisfy the public’s high expectations while still delivering a fresh shock.
That was why they had pasted so many photos on the wall.
They had listed an enormous number of candidates.
But paradoxically, the more that happened, the harder the decision became.
The Paradox of Choice.
When the range of options became too wide, people actually grew fatigued and found it harder to decide.
Put simply, the production team was currently trapped in a collective decision paralysis.
Whoever they picked would probably feel lacking.
Whoever they picked would probably seem risky.
And in that stalemate, they found me.
Of course, the title of merely being “a popular actor in Korea” would never have been enough to catch their attention.
Compared to the countless superstars pinned on that wall, I was just a strange outsider from the East.
There was another decisive reason they had called me here.
Ambiguity Aversion.
People tended to prefer options whose outcomes were somewhat predictable and verified, rather than uncertain options whose outcomes they could not foresee.
In that sense, was I not already a verified resource?
I had already proven both skill and buzz with hard data by even becoming King in the original Mystery Singer.
And on top of that, from the production team’s perspective, the best part was that I was still a fresh and mysterious existence to the American public.
Americans were not likely to have gone out of their way to search for videos of me singing.
In the end, I became a card that offered freshness to the public and proven stability to the production team.
And with Vacuum State recently making my face slowly known in America as well, even the timing was perfect.
Then...
Only one thing remained now.
Blow away the last fragment of doubt they had and plant certainty in its place.
People do not simply discover a good product and immediately buy it.
People want to buy the certainty that their choice is the right one.
And giving them that certainty was my specialty.
“Why should we choose you, specifically?”
The eyes of the producers seated at the table all turned toward me at once.
It was very American in its insistence. The implication was clear: sell yourself.
If I simply appealed with, “I sing well,” they would lose interest.
I smiled as if I had been waiting for that.
“Because I can deliver the most dramatic reversal.”
I leaned forward and looked straight into their eyes.
“Do you know the film Vacuum State, which I appeared in?”
“Of course. It’s ranking at the box office.”
“In that film, I do not say a single word.”
I mimed sealing my mouth shut with my fingers.
“At present, to American audiences, I am the silent actor. At the same time, I am a dark, heavy, mysterious Asian actor.”
Interest began to gather in the producers’ eyes.
“The viewers watch the program in suspense. It’s an unfamiliar voice, but the stage performance is incredible. And then, the moment the mask comes off... what if the face revealed is the face of silence? And on top of that, what if it is the lead actor of Hollywood master Quentin Marino’s next film?”
“......!!”
I drove the nail in with a confident voice.
“It is a perfect narrative. From silence to explosion, and then to becoming the new muse of a Hollywood master. And that catharsis will flow directly into the program’s ratings. Isn’t that exactly the picture you want most?”
Silence followed.
Not negative silence, but a tense silence filled with the sound of mental calculators running.
The producers exchanged looks with one another.
A picture was taking shape in their minds.
“...Good. The story is good.”
The white-haired man unclasped his hands and spoke.
“But if that logic is to hold, the most important thing is the stage itself. Can you prove it?”
Good.
I was more than ninety percent there.
Now came the final hurdle.
No matter how good the packaging was, if the contents were lacking, it was all worthless.
As if I had been waiting for this, I loosened my neck.
The moment the meeting had been confirmed, I had practiced this song countless times.
The song that could deliver the greatest shock to people.
“..........”
Until the very end of the song, not even the sound of breathing could be heard in the conference room.
After holding the final note long and opening my eyes as I caught my breath—
“...Wow.”
“...Crazy.”
The mouths of the production team were hanging open.
One of them was staring blankly at me without even realizing he had dropped the pen he was holding.
Then the white-haired man slowly began to clap.
Clap, clap, clap—
That applause soon spread through the entire room, and the man stood up and held out his hand to me.
“Welcome to our show, Mr. Ryu.”
The fatigue had disappeared from his face, replaced by a smile full of conviction.
A few days after returning to Korea, in the CEO’s office of Flash Entertainment, a thick stack of documents lay on the table.
CEO Hwang Cheoljun moistened his dry lips as he studied my expression.
Team Leader Jo Sehun, seated beside him, was also visibly tense.
“Have you finished reviewing everything?”
CEO Hwang Cheoljun asked carefully.
I closed the last page and nodded.
“Yes. I reviewed it thoroughly.”
The terms were beyond merely exceptional.
A signing bonus that far surpassed industry norms, a groundbreaking revenue-sharing ratio, and on top of that, a portion of the company’s shares granted as stock options.
It meant growing together not merely as a signed actor, but as an owner of the company and a true partner.
Scratch, scratch—
I wrote my full name on the final signature line and stamped it.
Thunk—
“I look forward to working with you, CEO.”
The faces of CEO Hwang Cheoljun and Team Leader Jo Sehun brightened at the same time.
It was as if a decade-old blockage in their chests had suddenly cleared.
And so, after successfully completing the renewal, a week later, I received a message from Quentin.
[Check Mate workshop. Thursday, 10:00 a.m.]
Evan Harris and Townsend, among others.
The date for the script reading and workshop, featuring the lead and supporting actors, was confirmed.