My Name is centred around Ji-woo — played by So-hee — who becomes consumed with revenge after witnessing her father murdered right in front of her when she was only 17.
She then approaches her father’s long-time friend Mu-jin (Park Hee-soon), who is the boss of Dongcheon — the country’s largest domestic drug ring — for help. Under him, she infiltrates the police force as Oh Hye-jin in a bid to find her father’s killer.
Fans can look forward to seeing a new side of So-hee, who told regional media in a virtual press conference on Oct 5 that she wanted to take on the challenge of portraying Ji-woo.
“[Ji-woo’s] desperation and determination was something I could really feel off the pages of the script. [Portraying the character] involved the use of the physical body through the action sequences. That was a new challenge for me,” she said.
In order to prepare herself for this role, she trained at an action school for three months prior to the shoot, gaining 10kg of muscles (and a bit of fats, she added) in the process.
“Since I worked out a lot, I ate what I wanted. So that’s how I gained 10 kilos,” she explained.
She learnt how to do action sequences with weapons and not injure her co-stars and her trainers in the course of it.
So-hee elaborated: “At first I thought that I would be able to pull it off easily, so I went to action school and attended one day of class. Then I [realised] once you try to fake it, you will end up not succeeding in it. It requires a lot of time and it’s not just me doing it alone, I have to do choreography with my partner.
“It was a lot of pressure, and I was also worried about hurting [others], so I had to be careful all the time, that was quite challenging.”
In the process, she found herself most comfortable using the baton.
“[It’s] actually the softest weapon, as it’s made of rubber. I had the least amount of pressure hitting someone with the baton because of that.”
So-hee added she feels physically stronger from all that training, and has taken up kickboxing.
She isn’t the only one who underwent a big image transformation in their careers. Here are other stars who did the same.
