Title : On Air
Cast :
Park Yong Ha - The director
Song Yoon Ah - The hysterical script writer
Kim Ha Nul - The *****y superstar "actress" Oh Seung Ha who cannot act.
Lee Bum Soo - The only honest and ethical agent in business
Synopse : A drama about making a drama.
Review : This is a pretty unusual series, a drama about making a drama. This series shows a detailed behind the curtain look of Korean drama industry, by following the entire precess of making a drama, from conceptualization to funding, casting, actual production, and how the production winds down. Watching this drama answers questions like,
- Why Korean "actresses" are *****y, cannot act, and prefer to shoot commercials over dramas.
- How two actresses who exhibit close friendship on carama are in fact pulling each other's hair out off camera.
- Why Korean dramas often take place in foreign locale, all paid for by the foreign government.
- Where they find people like Daniel Henney and Dennis O'Neal.
- Why Korean drama's runtime isn't fixed and can vary per episode.
- The pay rate of stars and script writers, and production cost(roughly $300K per episode for average drama to $1 million+ for a few blockbusters).
- How the storyline can change the day before the episode airs, including the ending.
- The shady nature of talent agency and how there is like only one good man out of whole industry.
- Why Korean dramas tend to be formulatic and lack creativity.(The script writer blames TV viwers).
- Why Korean dramas drag.
- Why Korean men drink every night, to escape stress from crazed women like the actress and script writer of the drama.
The realism of this drama is enhanced by the fact that all the characters have their real life counterparts. The hystetical script writer in the drama is based on the script writer herself(No, the real life script writer doesn't look like Song Yun Ah but I am sure she is hysterical like the script writer in the drama), so are the director, actresses, production staff, and shady agents. The biggest controversy was obviously whom the *****y superstar actress character Oh Seung Ha was modeled after. Actress Kim Ha Nul can deny it was her since she played the character, most suspect it was Son Ye Jin(Summer Scent, April Snow) based on industry reputation and gossip. Kim Hee Sun, another favorite suspect, was almost certainly not the model of Oh Seung Ha since her actual name and image is used in this drama and she wouldn't have given the permission to do so if it was her. Son Ye Jin is the only actress who has gone in public to deny she is the real-life model of Oh Seung Ha, but nobody buys her denial because of her ill reputation. It is this educational value and realism of this drama that makes it worth watching.
As for the drama itself, it's so so and pretty average, nothing much to write about in terms of plot. But once again, it's the ultra-realism of this drama that's the real draw. Strongly recommended for the educational value alone.