top of page

Yim Siwan in upcoming Coupang play drama ‘Once Upon a Boyhood’ - Updates before the release

Yim Siwan plays high school student Jang Byung Tae, a loner whose life goal is to live without getting hit but got misunderstood as and become the best fighter in Buyeo all of a sudden on the first day of his school transfer, and it is said to be a drama full of humour and fun.


Here is the poster for the show. Siwan shared this on his Instagram profile.


Below is the trailer of the show, with official English subtitles!

Here's Siwan's Instagram post with the same.


Here is the second trailer with official English subtitles. This series is surely going to be hilarious!


As per Namu Wiki this series will be globally released on Prime Video.


Here is the character poster.


A bit of a context: You can see that Siwan is "acting to fight" because the character is impersonating someone who fights, but is not really a fighter. The slight eye-roll adds fun to the character.


Siwan is training in boxing and he is quite good at it. We all know that he is very athletic. This is his brilliance as an actor, that in just one static image you can see someone who is "imitating to fight" but not really fighting. Siwan has unlearnt the body language as a boxing enthusiast, and gotten into the skin of the character that is completely different from his own self.


Here are latest stills released by Coupang Play.


Here are a few selects from behind the scenes stills from Plum A&C.



Below is the press conference held on 20th November.

Here's an article in The Korea Times from this conference.


Some pictures from the same conference & Siwan's instagram!

Here is the English translation of the press conference from 2 articles. Thanks to @jeaniepakjp for the efforts. If you liked these, please give the post a like!

Here are more posters from Coupang Play.



Coupang Play has changed their Instagram profile picture with Siwan!


Through this character, Siwan reveals charms from opposite sides of the spectrum between extreme shyness & boldness!


The series was be the cover story in Cine21 in November issue.


I have played youth in various works, but it has been a long time since I played a high school student.

'As soon as I read the script, I felt the need to do this work. I was so touched that they cut my physical age in half! I couldn't miss the opportunity to split the character into a character younger than his actual age. (laugh)'



'There is a scene where Ji-young (Lee Sun-bin) asks Byeong-tae an uncomfortable question, and he responds with a line like, “Aren't you always interfering? Stop asking questions.” However, when I filmed that scene, I was filled with the spirit of Chungcheong Province. So, “Are you a bad crop?" the ad-lib, “Why do you keep asking me questions?” came out naturally.'


'Among the characters I have played so far, none was as clumsy and naive as Byeong-tae. So I thought that the condition would be more similar to mine than any other role. Of course, there are many differences between Byeongtae and I. For example, the appearance of Byeongtae, who is not good at even simple arithmetic, is different from mine. (laugh)'



'There is a strangeness to the condition. Isn’t there a moment when everyone was bored during their school days? I hope that <Boyhood> and Byeong-tae will remind us of the old but precious memories of the past. I tried to never portray Byeong-tae as a good person. So, I hope that viewers will discover the greed and selfishness that everyone may have experienced in a corner of their hearts in relationships before becoming an adult.'


Translation of that page... from @everydaysiwan


In ‘Once Upon a Boyhood’, Yim Siwan plays Byung Tae, a loser who got misunderstood as the best fighter after he transferred school to Buyeo.


Siwan: "The unintentional series of coincidences in the drama drew laughters."


In addition, since it is a story that takes place in Chungcheong-do in the 1980s, Siwan prepared his role passionately by taking Chungcheong-do dialect classes and special dance lessons with Hyojin Choi to learn the dances that were popular at that time for three months before filming.


Director Lee Myung-woo: “I felt as if the 'Byung Tae' that I imagined had popped out. As soon as I saw him, I couldn’t help but be amazed and think, ‘There really was a character like that in the old days.’”, raising expectations as people can’t wait to see Siwan takes on comedic role in the drama.


The drama will be released on Coupang Play on November 24.



Here are more stills that have been released by Coupang Play.


Here's the rough translation from the Naver News article.

From being taught fighting by a childhood friend and Buyeo's Black Spider Ji-young (Lee Sun-bin), to the moment when the crisis was faced with the appearance of the real Asan White Tiger Kyung-tae (Lee Si-woo), who conquered all the schools in the area, and the first date with Buyeo's Sophie Marceau Sun-hwa (Kang Hye-won), who stole the hearts of all male students. Armed with an exciting story centered Byung-tae, a character full of personality created by a pleasant synergy of young actors, and retro sensibility that stimulates nostalgia in the 1980s, "Boyhood" promises a different kind of fun that has never been seen before and adds expectations.


Here is the coverage in English on



Comments

bottom of page