Do You Like Kids?
PD Choi Heewon. Writer Lee Geumsuk. Kim Iseo.
The three of them had gathered in one place, and a heated meeting was already underway.
"Product placement... Honestly, I hadn't given it much thought."
"Even if we put it in, we can't show it too blatantly. We can't leave it on screen for long, either. If it goes in at all, it has to brush past."
"Of course. The work comes first. The ad doesn't."
They were deep in discussion over the commercial for Extreme, the drink Sua had brought in, and whether it could be slipped into Special Task Force 808 as product placement.
What? They were going ahead without Sua?
No! Sua was right here!
...What's going on?
Sua tilted her head.
All she had wanted was to end the conversation as fast as possible and eat some beef, and yet when she came back to herself, the inside of the tent had turned into a conference room. They were even holding the meeting with great enthusiasm while leaving her out of it.
Of course, it was absolutely not the case that Sua was being shut out. From their side of things, they simply had no wish to bother someone who had only just finished shooting the climax, and Sua, for her part, was grateful. The moment they started asking her this and that, her head would spin.
Maybe I'll just quietly eat my meat.
Lately Sua had fallen deep into videos of arctic foxes, and on Mutube there was one titled An Arctic Fox Tries Beef for the First Time. The fox had eaten with incredible relish.
Yes. So this was fate.
Sua was simply destined to eat beef, and to eat it happily.
She had just lifted a piece with her chopsticks when—
"Sua."
"Ah. Yes."
At PD Choi Heewon's call, she hurriedly set the chopsticks down. Image. Image...
"I'm ashamed to pull you back in when you ought to be resting. But I think this is something I have to ask you."
"It's fine. Please, speak freely."
When Sua said as much and joined them, writer Lee Geumsuk spoke. Whether from a headache or from the problem itself, her expression was rather grave.
"Sua, first I want you to know that the three of us trust your eye more than anyone. There must have been a reason of your own for choosing this commercial. Isn't that so?"
"Yes."
Of course, of course! Sua barely swallowed the rest of it.
She had an extraordinary basis. She checked the Special Privilege window.
Energy Drink Commercial / Extreme
▶ Grade 2
▶ (...Readjusting...)
An extraordinary justification, the kind only the Special Privilege itself could provide—Grade 2—and because they were in the middle of discussing how to insert it as product placement, the whole assessment was being readjusted on several fronts.
Of course I'm expecting something. Who wouldn't?
Sua did not want to give this commercial up.
So she nodded once more.
"Yes. I don't want to let this one go."
"Mm. I understand what you mean, Sua."
Writer Lee Geumsuk nodded readily enough.
"But, Sua."
"Yes."
"The problem is that this product just so happens to be an energy drink. Product placement—indirect advertising—has to brush past naturally, feeling as if it isn't an ad at all, and we simply don't have a scene we can tuck it into."
"...I understand completely."
This time PD Choi Heewon, seated beside her, spoke.
"Lee Gangcheol isn't the sort of man who would so much as look at an energy drink, and for Kim Yu-han to go seeking one at this point in the story feels unnatural. Whichever way you turn it, we're hard up for a place to put it."
Sua tilted her head.
Hard up?
Strangely, a scene that seemed as if it would fit perfectly rose in her mind all on its own. Whether it came from having lived through the script, or purely from the Special Privilege, she couldn't say.
She opened her mouth.
"There's a scene coming up where Kim Yu-han protects the children from danger, right? The one where he jokes around to put them at ease, and draws them little pictures of cute things."
"Yes. I know the scene."
"What if he bought them an armful of drinks from the vending machine then? Obviously it would be strange to get them nothing but energy drinks, so he pulls several, and the energy drink just happens to be among them."
"Oh?"
Writer Lee Geumsuk and PD Choi Heewon reacted at the same time. Kim Iseo, too, looked as though the thought had never once occurred to her.
A moment later, writer Lee Geumsuk clicked her tongue in open admiration.
"That's actually good. Mixed in with the other drinks, it won't even feel like an ad, and it won't eat up much time."
"Yes. More than anything, it's natural. I like that."
"I'm in favor as well. And it isn't a scene Sua would struggle to play."
PD Choi Heewon and Kim Iseo followed with their full support. The drink's product placement was, for all practical purposes, a settled thing.
And then.
Quite suddenly, writer Lee Geumsuk spoke.
"Mm. But, Sua."
She stole a small, careful glance at Sua's face.
"Yes."
Sua nodded without a moment's hesitation. She adored that particular flavor of cuteness children had, adored it far too much.
Is she worried the kids might make a fuss?
To Sua, it seemed like nothing more than needless anxiety.
She was fairly good with small children, wasn't she?
She had yet to meet a single child who refused to follow her instructions. It was certain, after all. There were no bad children in the world.
"Ah... Well, if that's the case, I suppose it's a relief. But..."
The rest of them nodded. They did nod. The thoughts inside their heads, however, ran in the exact opposite direction from Sua's.
What if they're too scared of Sua?
Ah, I wonder if the kids will even be all right with this...
Convincing the parents is going to be quite the job.
They were worried about the children.
Now it was time to look into Starting Tomorrow, Crescendo.
After seeing PD Choi Heewon and writer Lee Geumsuk off, Kim Iseo stepped outside the tent and took out her phone.
The person whose number she had exchanged earlier. She meant to call the producer on the production team of Starting Tomorrow, Crescendo.
Ring— ring—
The moment she placed the call, the tone began to sound.
She was waiting for the other party to pick up when—
"There's no need for you to call the production team."
An abrupt remark, from someone.
Kim Iseo, whose attention had been fixed entirely on the phone, flinched before she could help it. The voice was unusually familiar.
And once she turned her head, she had even more reason to be startled.
"...Ah? Director Go Taemin?"
The man was none other than Director Go Taemin.
He looked exactly as Kim Iseo remembered him. A frame whittled down to almost nothing, eyes sunk deep into the skull. He might have been a withered old tree that had sold its soul for the sake of art.
"That's right. Thank you for recognizing me at once."
"How could I fail to? Given who I'm looking at."
"In any case, that fellow won't be picking up. I instructed him ahead of time. I told him I intended to come myself, so there was no need for him to take the call."
Kim Iseo slipped the phone into her pocket first.
"If it's a matter that would bring Director Go here in person..."
"The truth is, the reason I came to this set was Dohui. She had made it very clear that she wanted to take part in my film, and I liked that passion. So I came to see how she had changed."
"Park Dohui's acting really was excellent."
Kim Iseo thought back on the performance steeped in Park Dohui's bodily waste.
No. The performance steeped in her soul. How much courage must it have taken to put on an act like that in front of a camera?
...Not that she wanted a Mystic actor doing that kind of acting. Remarkable was remarkable, but that sort of thing was a bit— anyway.
"If you have business with Dohui, there's no reason to come to me, is there? I don't have any particular connection with her."
"I've already been to see Dohui. I told her the dazzling progress she'd made left an impression. We also spoke about how I hoped she would work even harder from here on. But..."
Director Go Taemin smiled, a thin flash of teeth.
"...After I arrived on set, I changed my mind. Today, I'd like to have a rather different conversation with the CEO of Mystic. The sort of conversation I didn't have with Dohui's people."
Here, Kim Iseo's business antennae stirred.
It was a sense she possessed by instinct.
Ah. This is about to roll into a business discussion. And if a master like Go Taemin is the one bringing it up, it won't be anything small.
Director Go Taemin went on.
"Sua has a way of making a person marvel. In all sorts of ways."
"I feel the same. I can never predict her."
Kim Iseo meant it.
Sua, who now belonged to Mystic. These days Kim Iseo felt she had been startled as thoroughly as a person could be startled, and that she was slowly coming to understand her. But it was precisely in those moments that Sua would jolt everyone around her once again, and always in a direction no one had seen coming.
Director Go Taemin continued.
"That incident with the sound team... You were there then too, weren't you, CEO Kim? From what I saw, she seems to have studied sound a little, and she appears to come with English installed as a basic feature."
"That's right."
"I felt it then. CEO Kim, you've truly drawn your sword. What are we supposed to do if you go all the way overseas and haul back an invasive species like that?"
"Overseas... an invasive species..."
Kim Iseo paused there to think.
What was there even to think about?
The truth is, I don't know a thing about Sua's past either.
But she soon shook her head inwardly.
No. Just from the circumstances, it's certain she was trained overseas. And Director Go Taemin is a big fish I absolutely cannot let get away. This isn't the time to explain every trivial detail.
Kim Iseo's mind reached a clear conclusion.
This was not the moment to lay out, point by point, everything she knew about Sua. It was time to run a business on the interest Director Go Taemin already held. And to run it like a mountain.
Kim Iseo inclined her head, just slightly.
"First, thank you for praising our actor. May I take it that I can look forward to whatever you're about to say?"
"Good. It is about time we got to the point."
Director Go Taemin held out his phone.
A calendar app was open on the screen.
"Have Mystic set a date."
"A date?"
"Yes. This is an 808 shoot, after all. If we're going to talk about something else, we ought to fix a proper date and place, don't you think?"
"You mean you'd like a meeting?"
Go Taemin nodded, and Kim Iseo swallowed dryly.
A meeting with a master director.
And after she looked at the calendar on the phone, her surprise grew larger still.
What? It's completely empty?
The calendar was blank from end to end.
There was no possibility that a master of Go Taemin's stature had a schedule this open. Kim Iseo's own calendar, or those of the actors signed to Mystic—check any of them, and they were packed to the margins.
The implication, in other words, was clear.
Director Go is adjusting himself to our schedule?
Kim Iseo felt, all over again, that something insane was happening.
But this was a windfall that needed no second thought. It was not something she could let slip, nor could she keep a director showing this much sincerity waiting for long. So she took the nearest date.
"I don't think we need to keep each other waiting. How about we meet in three days?"
"Three days. Good."
Go Taemin nodded.
"Then, for those three days, Mystic should look this over."
"Ah. Look what over?"
Instead of answering, Go Taemin held out a paper envelope.
Written across the face of the brown paper envelope, in marker, was Starting Tomorrow, Crescendo. What was inside was, of course, the script.
...!
Kim Iseo had to work to hide her surprise.
In effect, she had just received a casting offer straight from the director himself.
The next day.
In the drama conference room at the tvS broadcasting station, the bureau chief sat alone, checking this and that on a tablet.
At the moment, his expression was very bad indeed.