Let Cheon-yeong Live
The Yang Ho-gun that Jo Yong-jin had built was solid enough. The problem was simply that he hadn't been able to hold it together in front of Cheon-yeong.
The director said it was Yang Ho-gun — but the one who actually has to stop wavering is me. Yang Ho-gun is a character with a sharply defined personality, after all.
It was a way of saying he'd been outmatched, but Jo Yong-jin felt no shame. He had known it from the moment they first met. Lee Su-a was a genius beyond any comparison to himself. Age had nothing to do with it; he had to work so he could close even a fraction of the gap.
Jo Yong-jin smiled faintly. I'll have to brag to Je-hyun hyung about this. Once the film opened, Do Je-hyun would spend a long time regretting that he hadn't been in it.
"Su-chan."
"Yes — yessir!"
"As I said earlier, in the beginning you have to stand clearly against Yang Ho-gun. Give me the gravitas and loyalty of a true military officer. And even if you're afraid of Cheon-yeong, if you show yourself standing up to her, the character will come across as extremely compelling."
Bae Su-chan nodded over and over. He had been worried that the rare, substantial role he'd finally landed might end up being hated, but Director Hong Il-beom's words put him at ease. Of course, actually playing the part of standing up to Cheon-yeong would be another matter entirely. He glanced sideways at Lee Su-a and let out a small sigh. He was already dreading how much of a lecture his manager hyung would give him once the reading was over.
Even as he delivered his notes, Hong Il-beom never stopped writing. He looked at Ye Na-ri, and she went slightly rigid with nerves.
"And Na-ri."
"Yes..."
"Among the Il-yeong, Ji-sook is the only one who sees Cheon-yeong as a human being. In other words, Cheon-yeong and Ji-sook regard each other as equals."
"W-wouldn't the class system have made her treat Cheon-yeong as a superior?"
"That's a fair point. But if that were the case, Cheon-yeong wouldn't have leaned on Ji-sook the way she does. She would have merely regarded her as a cut above the others."
"Ah...!"
Ye Na-ri understood completely and accepted the director's interpretive direction. What still troubled her was the question of what mindset would let her regard that Cheon-yeong as an equal.
Looking at the three of them lost in thought, Director Hong Il-beom was satisfied. Some actors treated his character notes as interference. He had no intention of dismissing an actor's interpretation, or the individuality that sprang from it — he only wanted to refine that interpretation and that individuality so they would serve the work a little better.
And sitting right there was the child who, for the first time in his life as a director, had shown him an interpretation and a presence that surpassed every expectation he had held.
"Su-a."
"Yes."
Lee Su-a looked a little tired. She had held a razor-sharp focus through the entire reading, so it was only natural. Even thinking about it again, the whole thing was so outrageous that Hong Il-beom let out a dry laugh.
"You did well. Let's keep going just like this."
Lee Su-a blinked her large eyes slowly, then pursed her lips — as if she were dissatisfied.
"Am I the only one who doesn't get homework?"
Everyone left in the room laughed quietly. No one could dislike a child actor this eager. Hong Il-beom smiled with quiet dignity.
"Isn't it better not to have homework? If you insist, then work on your stamina a little more."
"Yeees."
The actors, each with an assignment in hand, took their leave one by one, promising the next session. Ye Na-ri personally walked the tired Lee Su-a all the way to the van. She spoke as she struggled to pull Ji-sook out from the Il-yeong.
"Your acting today was truly impressive. I'll work hard and do my best as well."
"Unni."
Lee Su-a beckoned to her. When Ye Na-ri bent down, puzzled, the child reached out and tucked her hair behind her ear.
"Huh?!"
Watching Ye Na-ri flinch and pull back, Lee Su-a laughed.
"You're unni now! Hehe. Don't try so hard to become the Il-yeong or Ji-sook themselves. I'm curious about you too, unni. If you can't stand firmly as yourself, won't any role you put on get blown over by the slightest breeze?"
"That's..."
Leaving those cryptic words behind, Lee Su-a was gone. Ye Na-ri stayed where she was, turning them over in her mind for a long time.
"I want to give Cheon-yeong more screen time."
Lee Ok-dan, who hadn't said a word from the reading until now, dropped the bombshell.
"I wrote her, but I never imagined she'd be realized this compellingly. We can't show only this much of her. Ending it like this would be too much of a waste."
Hong Il-beom, who was driving, agreed inwardly. The person who had shone brightest at this reading was, without question, Lee Su-a. A film script is never thin, and Lee Ok-dan's screenplays — with their meticulously written action lines — ran thicker than other scripts of comparable length. And yet Lee Su-a had performed looking at the other actors instead of the pages, as if she had every stage direction by heart. For hours on end, she had been a perfect Cheon-yeong.
"Honestly, I wrote Cheon-yeong thinking she wasn't human. A child worshipped as a god from the time she was little, never given room for a self to grow — where would the humanity even come from? But when Su-a looked at Ji-sook with Cheon-yeong's face..."
Lee Ok-dan couldn't finish the sentence.
It had been the highlight of the reading. On the verge of burning to death together with the Dangsan Tree, Cheon-yeong had looked at Ji-sook — who was desperately trying to save her — and smiled. It wasn't an expression of agony, and it wasn't fear. It was the look of a child gathering her courage before running the very first errand of her life.
In a word, an utterly ordinary face. And yet, given every face Cheon-yeong had shown throughout the reading, given the situation bearing down on her, it was a face that could not possibly have been ordinary. The idea Lee Ok-dan had tried to fold quietly into the script — that Cheon-yeong became an ordinary child only in front of Ji-sook, among all the Il-yeong — Lee Su-a had realized perfectly in that single scene.
"Su-a's Cheon-yeong is far more compelling than the one I wrote. I can't just let a child like that go."
"So what do you want to do?"
Hong Il-beom broke a long silence to ask. Lee Ok-dan shot him a look.
"Let's keep Cheon-yeong alive. We can't give her any more weight in the main film, so let's at least do that."
"Aigoo..."
"What's with the sigh? Wouldn't this be good for you too? If we cut the scene of a child burning to death, the rating comes down, and a change this size isn't going to blow up the shooting schedule."
"It just keeps making me greedy."
"For what?"
Hong Il-beom spoke in a dry voice.
"A series? That's worth being greedy for. The protagonist's character is well locked in, and if Cheon-yeong doesn't die, we can float the implication that she might appear in a sequel..."
"The Dangsan Tree burns. Cheon-yeong becomes human. Yang Ho-gun takes her in as a disciple and raises her while they solve case after case..."
"Hmm?"
"And then when Cheon-yeong comes of age, Yang Ho-gun retires, she inherits the protagonist's seat, and the series starts all over again..."
Lee Ok-dan's mouth fell slightly open. This wasn't some American season-based television drama. Su-a was ten years old — was he proposing they plan this for a decade at minimum? Did that even make sense?
...It kind of does make sense, though?
It even sounded fun.
Hong Il-beom eased the car into its space and looked at Lee Ok-dan. She was smiling with a dreamer's face. His own expression was probably much the same.
That night, the couple talked long into the night.
Today's workout was basketball — or it would have been, until an unexpected visitor sent Gwon Du-il and Lee Su-a straight back to the office.
"Kept you waiting, didn't we? Sorry about that. We look a wreck."
"Not at all. The fault is mine for arriving unannounced. Please think nothing of it."
Fortunately, the call had come right after warm-ups, so there was no danger of greeting him reeking of sweat. Gwon Du-il and Lee Su-a, in their loose athletic wear, sat down across from Director Hong Il-beom. He wet his throat with the tea Lee Won-seok had brought, then went straight to the point.
"We're considering changing the ending. From Cheon-yeong dies and Ji-sook lives, to Cheon-yeong lives and Ji-sook dies."
"This suddenly?"
He said it as if taken aback, but inside, Gwon Du-il was cheering. He could guess why those two characters' fates had been swapped.
"I hesitate to get too far ahead of ourselves, but this is a decision made with a sequel in mind."
Originally, Ji-sook had been the one to survive because she was the more versatile character. They could have written a romance with Yang Ho-gun or Kang Geon-bok, who were close to her in age — or, failing that, brought her onto the sequel's core team as its only woman. Cheon-yeong, by contrast, was a character who would have to grow up alongside Su-a the actress, which meant a cautious approach from the production stage onward.
And yet they had decided to change the ending. That could only mean Su-a's performance at the reading had left that deep an impression.