WeTried Translations

Translator/Editor: Potter

Discord: https://dsc.gg/wetried

◈ Why Do My Dramas Keep Becoming Hits!? ◈

Chapter 18: Are You Trying to Ruin the Drama? (4)

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The first shoot for SBC's drama <Suspect X> ended safely, followed by a wrap party.

The place was a frenzy of excitement.

"Oh! Really?! CP Han's paying for dinner tonight?"

"Ha ha ha! That's right! Eat as much as you want! It's all on me tonight!"

"Thank you! We'll enjoy it!"

A broad smile hung on the face of CP Han Kang-hee, who was known for being strict.

The assistant directors and staff grilling meat chatted happily as they clinked glasses.

There was only one reason the mood was heated enough to wash away the exhaustion of the first shoot.

A massive disaster had struck their competitor, tvM.

"Heh! The drinks taste especially good today. Why are they so damn delicious?"

"Hey, when I saw that exclusive article on Baek Kang-min earlier, I didn't even need side dishes. He really took a huge dump on them before leaving."

"They need to start shooting right away, and they've lost one of their leads. Damn, just thinking about it feels good."

"That place must be like a funeral home by now. Heh heh heh."

They said someone else's misfortune was your happiness.

And the misfortune of tvM's <Living with My Ex-Boyfriend Somehow>, a competing drama in the same time slot, was practically a celebration for SBC.

"Seeing how they're already going off the rails, that place is finished. If we just keep MBS's <The Snare> in check, won't the entire ratings pie for the second half of this year be ours?"

"Ha ha ha! Exactly! Cheers!"

As glasses clinked brightly, Han Kang-hee smiled at his leisure.

The person enjoying this the most was undoubtedly Han Kang-hee.

The ratings battle with tvM was secondary to him. He had long held a deep grudge against Ji Yeon-woo, the writer of <Living with My Ex-Boyfriend Somehow>.

Heh heh heh. That bastard thinks he can write? What a joke.

It was ridiculous enough that a PD who had worked under him while preparing for his directorial debut had presumptuously picked up a pen and crawled out.

But then he had joined tvM's tentpole lineup in the same time slot?

Han Kang-hee had been looking forward to watching him fail with his own two eyes, only for the fool to throw himself into the gutter before things even began.

There could be no sweeter drinking snack for Han Kang-hee.

Then, a woman suddenly entered his line of sight as he smiled contentedly.

Someone who seemed oddly detached from the noisy gathering.

It was Seong Yu-ra, the main writer of <Suspect X>.

Even as the meat in front of her burned black, she stared intently at her phone screen.

Is she revising the script even at the wrap party?

Tilting his head, Han Kang-hee picked up his glass and casually approached her.

"Ha ha! Writer Seong, what are you watching so intently? Don't tell me you're revising the script here too?"

He made the joke lightly, but Seong Yu-ra did not take her eyes off the screen as she answered flatly.

"It's the behind-the-scenes video from tvM's script reading that was released yesterday."

"What? Why would you watch that? Once Baek Kang-min's drunk-driving scandal broke, the network must've made all of it private."

"That's why I saved it before it came down. I thought I should watch it."

"Good grief. That drama will collapse on its own, and you're still analyzing it? So, how is it? Is it at least entertaining to watch?"

Han Kang-hee gave a disbelieving laugh, but Seong Yu-ra's expression was unusually serious.

No, it held something beyond seriousness, a mixture of shock and awe.

"...Cha Ye-rin and Choi Tae-kyung. I knew they both lived up to their reputations."

Seong Yu-ra swallowed dryly.

"But this second male lead. Baek Kang-min's acting is truly unbelievable."

"Baek Kang-min?"

"Yes. The character itself is incredibly layered. He's clearly the second male lead, but he grabs your attention in the frame several times more than the male lead. The dialogue has bite, but the actor's diction and energy make it incredibly compelling."

From the perspective of a fellow writer, the cast of <Living with an Ex-Boyfriend> was an ideal ensemble.

It was barely an exaggeration to say that the characters in the text had truly come alive.

But Han Kang-hee only snorted at her words.

"What good is that? He's already gone down the drain over a drunk-driving hit-and-run."

"That's true."

Seong Yu-ra nodded heavily.

The actor who was so vividly alive on the screen would soon be completely buried in the industry.

And the damage tvM would suffer from Baek Kang-min's departure would be devastating.

A chilling thought naturally rose in one corner of Seong Yu-ra's mind.

What if...

What if Baek Kang-min had not left the drama?

What if tvM had faced us head-on with this insane lineup and script?

Could we have won?

...I don't know.

Even as an A-list writer in the industry, she could not confidently claim the upper hand.

What should she call this situation?

She regretted the competing drama's downfall, but she was also relieved by it.

"Come on, don't worry about pointless things. Have a drink. Now we just need to make sure we crush those bastards at MBS and <The Snare>."

"Mm, yes."

"Ha ha. Luck is part of talent in this business, isn't it? Those tvM rejects were doomed to fail from the beginning."

Luck was part of talent.

There might not be a phrase that captured the drama industry more accurately.

Seong Yu-ra accepted the glass he offered and nodded with difficulty.

#

"...."

"...."

Perfect silence, so complete that not even breathing could be heard.

From Director Woo Young-taek behind the camera to the assistant director, dozens of staff members, and the waiting actors.

Everyone on set stared blankly at the center of the set as if they had agreed to do so.

At the end of their gazes stood the second male lead, Han Tae-yoon.

No, seven-year unknown actor Do Jae-hyun.

"I... damn it. I've held it in because I didn't want you to see me looking pathetic. But this isn't right."

It was a scene where he desperately clung to the female lead and poured out his resentment.

An emotional arc of sorrow and desperation, the classic second male lead scene.

But despite being called a classic, it was a damn difficult performance.

If he put too much force into it, it would look unbearably cringeworthy or artificial. But if he held back too much, it would become neither one thing nor the other.

Gulp.

The assistant director, who was staring intently at the monitor, unconsciously swallowed.

Yes, an ugly performance where the actor screamed and fell apart was a hundred times easier.

Those scenes could somehow be handled if the actor simply threw everything into the emotion.

But a performance where someone fell apart beautifully?

Not just anyone could do that.

It was not something an actor could pull off with good looks alone.

Explosion and restraint.

He had to be desperate yet calm. Miserable but not pathetic, pitiable yet appealing.

It was direction that sounded outright contradictory.

Yet the unknown actor before them was perfectly maintaining that insanely difficult balance, as though walking a tightrope.

"Why...? Did you get sick of me after playing with me as much as you wanted? If this was how it was going to be, you shouldn't have given me hope from the start. Why do you keep making me look like an idiot?"

His voice trembled now and then. His brow was twisted.

Yet every word he delivered was so clear that it struck the ear, and even his rough breaths and slightly trembling fingertips seemed meticulously calculated.

The suffocating immersion left the staff unable to close their mouths.

And that overwhelming acting swallowed even the actor performing with him in the frame.

"Th-That's not it... I..."

Cha Ye-rin, who played the female lead Min A-young, began to stammer before finally falling silent.

Overwhelmed by Do Jae-hyun's intensity, she had forgotten her line and frozen blankly.

"Ah..."

"Cut! Min A-young's line got swallowed, right? We'll cut here for now!"

Director Woo Young-taek caught Cha Ye-rin's flustered expression and urgently called for a cut.

Only then did the taut tension pressing down on the set break with a snap.

"S-Sorry. I lost hold of the emotion for a moment. I'll go again right away!"

Even veteran Cha Ye-rin blushed in embarrassment as she hurriedly apologized.

Normally, the atmosphere would have turned cold, but no staff member blamed her mistake.

No, they did not even care about her NG in the first place.

During the brief reset, the staff's gazes poured toward Do Jae-hyun, who was catching his breath in a corner of the set.

"Hey, did you see that? Who the hell is that guy? Why is he so good at acting?"

"Wow... I got goosebumps watching the monitor. Did you see Cha Ye-rin get startled and mess up? Is that really the guy who used to be a background extra?"

"Seriously, after the middle of the scene, I couldn't even see Cha Ye-rin anymore. I just kept watching Han Tae-yoon."

"Honestly, I had zero expectations when I heard he was Baek Kang-min's replacement. But the way he teared up in that camera angle was insane. Once this airs, a whole truckload of people will catch second-lead syndrome."

An unknown actor hastily brought in to fill the hole left by Baek Kang-min, who had caused a massive scandal and left.

They had not expected even a speck of greatness from him, yet rather than being overwhelmed by a top star, he had swallowed her entire scene.

It did not feel real.

The person most shocked of all was cinematographer Huh Jin-man, who had captured Do Jae-hyun's performance from the closest distance.

"He's crazy..."

Huh Jin-man gave a hollow laugh as he looked at Do Jae-hyun's close-up on the playback monitor.

"He's someone who knows how to play inside the frame. Damn, you can never beat people born with that kind of talent."

"Hyung."

As Huh Jin-man muttered to himself in a tone that might have been admiration or lamentation, Director Woo Young-taek quietly approached and handed him an old, thick notebook.

"...? What's this?"

"Open it."

Huh Jin-man opened the notebook with a puzzled expression.

Then, in the next moment, his eyes widened as though they would split apart.

"....."

The inside of the notebook was filled with an obsession bordering on madness.

The relationships between the characters and the emotional arcs shifting from scene to scene were only the beginning.

The hidden intentions in every single line, the subtext, had been painstakingly broken down in red ink.

That was not all.

The movements around the set, the heights and angles of the camera, the way to look toward the lens, and even the tilt of the head had all been obsessively noted with arrows and diagrams.

There were even visual and physical details such as, <Midway through line, stop breathing for 0.5 seconds>, <Tremble fingertips slightly>, and <Fix gaze so tears gather only at the corner of the right eye>.

The contents were so analytical and detailed that they gave him goosebumps.

This was not a simple script analysis. It was closer to a blueprint that had sculpted an entire frame.

"What the hell does this writer do? The script wasn't enough, so he wrote acting direction notes this obsessively? And what advice did he give the actor for his acting to change so much overnight?"

"Heh heh heh."

"Good grief. Should I call this person a pervert or a genius?"

As Huh Jin-man clicked his tongue in shock, Woo Young-taek grinned.

"Hyung, that isn't the writer's notebook."

"What?"

"I said it wasn't the writer who made those notes. That belongs to the seven-year veteran over there, the one we never expected anything from."

"...??"

Huh Jin-man froze.

"W-What bullshit are you talking about? You're saying this belongs to that actor? Th-This...?"

"Heh, doesn't make sense, does it? I was shocked too. Really."

Talent?

Not a chance.

That guy had spent seven years as an unknown actor doing this mad shit every single day without fail.

Even when he played minor characters no one else bothered to look at.

As Woo Young-taek stared at Do Jae-hyun with an incredulous expression, one question suddenly crossed his mind.

His gaze naturally followed one man.

"Wait, why are you good?"

"Y-Yes?"

"Why are you good? I honestly didn't think you had this in you, Mr. Jae-hyun."

"Ah ha ha... Thank you. It's all thanks to Writer Ji. Truly."

"No. That's not what I mean."

A man approached the flushed Do Jae-hyun and questioned him in an indifferent tone.

It was Ji Yeon-woo, the main writer of the drama and the person responsible for setting up this crazy situation.

...What did Writer Ji see in him?

He had plucked a completely untested unknown actor from among hundreds of background extras in an instant.

When everyone called him crazy and fiercely opposed it, he had stubbornly placed Do Jae-hyun in the second male lead role of a tentpole drama.

"I seriously have no idea what kind of person he is."

"Do you develop an eye for actors after working under Seo Eun-hye...?"

"I've never seen anything like this. It doesn't even feel real. His eye for people is downright supernatural."

"Exactly. Honestly, I had doubts at first, but now I'm getting goosebumps. How did he recognize a monster like that at first glance and pull him out?"

Ji Yeon-woo, the writer who had seen through everything and completely turned the board around.

Before anyone realized it, the eyes of those looking at him trembled with reverence.

#

Ha Do-woon, the head of tvM's drama planning department, felt as though their ass was on fire.

"The number you have dialed is switched off. After the tone, you will be connected to voice mail..."

"Why isn't this bastard answering his phone?!"

Ha Do-woon screamed at the top of their lungs.

The PDs at the surrounding desks lowered their heads quickly, careful not to get caught in the blast.

"Damn it!"

It had already been several hours.

Ha Do-woon had made dozens of calls, but Director Woo Young-taek's phone repeated the same automated message.

"This son of a bitch! Is he completely out of control now?!"

tvM's drama department was currently in a state of emergency.

Losing Baek Kang-min, a key lead in <Living with My Ex-Boyfriend Somehow>, the tentpole drama for the second half of the year they had prepared at the risk of everything, was already enough of a headache.

But the follow-up news from the set had driven Ha Do-woon close to fainting.

Who the hell is Do Jae-hyun?

They had received a report saying that they had forced filming ahead after inserting some complete newcomer as Baek Kang-min's replacement.

Ha Do-woon doubted what they had heard at the absurd report.

An actor named Do Jae-hyun.

Even after searching on portal sites, he could find neither a profile nor any trace of him.

So they had put an unknown actor with no background whatsoever into a lead-level role in a tentpole drama backed by the network's greatest investment?

Did that make any sense?

"Even if he's lost his mind, there are limits! What the hell does he think he's doing?!"

Ha Do-woon's blood felt as though it was rushing backward.

Ha Do-woon wanted to tear the set apart immediately, but Woo Young-taek had seemingly blocked all outside contact to prevent exactly that.

Which only made him more curious.

What was happening at the set?

Where had this Do Jae-hyun guy come from, and who had the nerve to put someone like that in the role?

No, were they even filming with him in the first place?

There was no way the staff would let filming continue while witnessing that.

As one question led to another and horrifying thoughts gnawed at Ha Do-woon's mind...

"Department Head! The bureau chief is calling for you! You are to come to the main conference room by half past!"

"Fuck... This is driving me insane."

The matter was too serious.

Tae San-hyeok, the most powerful figure at the network, had called an emergency meeting because he was prepared to deal severely with this lead replacement.

This would not do.

If Ha Do-woon went up to the conference room without understanding the situation at all, they would obviously end up on the chopping block alongside Woo Young-taek.

Biting their lip in anxiety, Ha Do-woon picked up their phone again.

Please answer. Please.

Ha Do-woon prayed thousands of times in their heart as they dialed Woo Young-taek's number.

Ring-ring-ring!

"...?"

A ringing tone began playing from the phone that Ha Do-woon had naturally expected to be off.

Before it rang three times,

"Yes, Department Head."

Woo Young-taek's impossibly calm voice came through the receiver.

The moment Ha Do-woon heard it, their pent-up anger exploded.

"You crazy bastard! Where are you right now?!"

"Why are you suddenly shouting? You're hurting my ears."

Ha Do-woon squeezed their eyes shut, then opened them as they fired back like a machine gun.

"Are you out of your mind?! I heard you put some fucking nameless extra in as Baek Kang-min's replacement! What the hell happened on set?!"

Despite Ha Do-woon's enraged shouting, Woo Young-taek sounded strangely calm on the other end.

If anything, he seemed relaxed enough to hum.

"Come on, Department Head. Don't worry. The shoot ended incredibly well, and I'm in the editing room now."

"The, the, editing room...?! Look at this goddamn lunatic!"

Ha Do-woon's eyes widened as though they would pop out.

If Ha Do-woon had heard right, Woo Young-taek was sitting around in the editing room during this crisis.

"Why the hell are you there?! Haven't you heard? An emergency meeting was just called! Get your situation report and run to my office right now!"

"Yes, yes, I know. I was just informed."

"Then why the fuck are you still there if you know?! Don't you know the bureau chief called you?!"

"Exactly."

Woo Young-taek gave a light scoff.

"I can't go empty-handed. I need to bring a bargaining chip before going up to see the bureau chief."

"What? A bargaining chip?"

"Yes. The rough cut from today's shoot is ready. I'll use this to impress the bureau chief."

Ha Do-woon could only blink with a vacant expression.

Had Woo Young-taek finally lost his mind?

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