Actor's Kang Seok-woo's 'bravo my life'

Actor's Kang Seok-woo's 'bravo my life'. December. 26, 2016 07:05. by Sun-Hee Jang sun10@donga.com. “I cannot believe three decades have passed already…. I can still vividly remember the time I waited anxiously at a café in front of Myeongbo Theater on the first screening day. As thirty years have passed, and I thought I was ‘fading away’ from the public, but everything is so real again after thirty years. You never know what will happen next.”

Thirty years have passed since the melodrama “Winter Traveler” directed by Gwak Ji-gyun hit the box-office and drew 220,000 audiences in 1986. Based on Choi In-ho’s novel series published on the Dong-A Ilbo from 1983 to 1984, the film threw questions to the audience on what true love was, starring the then-darlings Kang Seok-woo, Ahn Seong-ki, and Lee Mi-sook.

An interview was held on Thursday with actor Kang Seok-woo, who then played a tragic character “Min-woo.” Besides his professional career, Kang was an attentive father at a TV entertainment program and also a friendly radio DJ interacting with his audiences on his classics program, which shows the highest rating among other programs aired at similar hours.

“Listeners often mention movies when it gets chilly or Schubert’s ‘Winterreise’ is playing on my program. They still remember the movie in their hearts. The film cranked in on the third week of November 1985, and I can still clearly remember the first scene in front of the poetry gravestone of Korea’s greatest poet Yoon Dong-ju," the 59-year-old said. We raked the fallen leaves in early December, and flew them during the shots in late December. It was so romantic back then.”

Kang conveyed his sorrows to the director who ended his life in 2010 and the novelist Choi In-ho who died of cancer in 2013.

“I first met Director Gwak as a newcomer in the movie scene in 1978, when he was a 25-year-old scripter for the 1978 movie ‘Yeosu.’ Come to think of it, the lead male characters always died tragically in his movie," Kang said. "I asked many times for a drink or two after the shooting, but he never replied. I should have just crashed in to his place if I knew he’d end his life so suddenly. In-ho was also like my blood-brother who was an iconic person in the Korean culture of our times.”

To many young generations, Kang is familiar for his roles as a “middle-aged father of the lead male characters” inside many TV dramas, but he continuously starred as the main character since “Winter Traveler” as the “hottest youth star” in those days. Still, he has been working all by himself without a manager.

“I consider myself as an actor, not a star. Can you name the celebrities who gained the most spotlight three years ago? You see, popularity fades away just like that," he said. "I think I knew that quite early. I felt the spotlight, but never soaked into it.”

Kang rather enjoys his glamorous mid-life style. “I also miss those days when I was younger and more handsome. But there is more than that when you get older," the actor said. "The best part is that you do not see the world as a thing to criticize. You tend to be more generous to others and your work. I can see that all my hair turned white whenever I am in front of a mirror, but I actually like that.”

Kang’s schedules are very tight like other top celebrities. “I DJ every morning, and run a talk show. I recently released an album with classical music pieces I selected, and I will also produce a classical music performance to be held next February at the Hall of Arts," he said. "I’m also starting a new TV drama early next January. Oh, and I have to study Japanese after this interview."

He expressed his gratitude to the fans who still remember the “Winter Traveler.” “Whenever I read the series or the scenario, I never stopped crying while reading the ‘Winter Traveler.’ I would like the film to be remembered as a movie which resonates the sweet and bitter youth of the 1970s with today’s youngsters, and also bring back my youth for the older generations,” Kang said.