The upcoming High Kick Through the Roof, the new MBC sitcom brought to you by the makers of Unstoppable High Kick, started filming this month and has already put in its first all-nighter.

The family sitcom’s first day on the set was August 20 at the Ilsan Dream Center in the city of Goyang. (The first outdoor shoot was on the 12th.) All of the main players were present, which includes grandparent characters Lee Soon-jae and Kim Ja-ok, parents Jung Bo-seok and Oh Hyun-kyung, and the younger cast including Daniel Choi (The World They Live In), Seo Shin-ae (Thank You), Shin Sae-kyung (Queen Seon-deok), Hwang Jung-eum (We Got Married), Julien Kang (Dream), and new singer AJ.

The show is being called “High Kick 2,” although it’s not really a sequel and employs all new characters. What it has in common is its PD Kim Byung-wook, who is known for creating “syndromes” (pop-culture sensations) with his sitcoms, which may lack grand visual tableaux but are bolstered by interesting stories about ordinary families that draw in viewers.

High Kick Through the Roof will premiere on September 7.

Via No Cut News, Review Star

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Shin Sae-kyung, Seo Shin-ae, Daniel Choi

I wasn’t excited to hear about the upcoming Season 2 of family sitcom Unstoppable High Kick, which would cast an entirely new crop of actors (the only exception being veteran Lee Soon-jae, the grandpa of the original series, who will be in the second season as well).

But I may have to rethink it now that the rest of its cast has been announced, and among them are Thank You’s precocious and adorable Seo Shin-ae, The World They Live In’s endearing screw-up Daniel Choi, and up-and-comer Shin Sae-kyung (most recently of Queen Seon-deok and Ogamdo).

The story has 19-year-old Shin Sae-kyung and 10-year-old Seo Shin-ae playing sisters who, on account of their debt-ridden father, come to Seoul on the run. The two sisters enter Lee Soon-jae’s household as maids, while Daniel Choi plays Lee Soon-jae’s son.

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MBC hosted its awards ceremony for the 2008 Acting Awards on December 30. Let me first reiterate that I think these end-of-year broadcast-station awards are mostly meaningless. That said, this year’s Daesangs were TOTAL WEAKSAUCE, MBC. Top honor (the “Daesang” grand prize) went to…

Oh, you mean it was split this year? Between Beethoven Virus’s much-lauded epitome of awesomeness, Kim Myung-min, and East of Eden’s overblown and overrated Song Seung-heon?? I mean, I could understand going for the sentimental vote and awarding deceased Choi Jin-shil (she got a lifetime achievement instead), but Song Seung-heon winning acting awards is in itself a joke.

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About a week ago, I mentioned the new drama project for child actor Seo Shin-ae. (Most of us may remember her from starring in the heartwarming 2007 drama Thank You alongside Jang Hyuk and Gong Hyo-jin.)

To accompany the news, her management has recently released new photos of Seo, and she’s grown up a lot — still adorable and round-cheeked, but much less child than she was just a year ago. (Not a little girl, not yet a woman? Or perhaps, more apropos to her career: not a baby star anymore, not yet a plastic-surgeried tartlet-in-training. Let’s hope this talented girl never ends up there.) Just to give you a refresher, here’s what she looked like in Thank You —>

Her new series is the KBS1 daily drama Glory of Youth [청춘예찬], which will air when the currently running Big Sister vacates its time slot in January.

Via Sports Khan

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The little girl who stole viewers’ hearts as the precocious HIV-stricken Bom in last year’s Thank You, ten-year-old Seo Shin-ae, is returning to television in KBS’s new daily drama Glory of Youth, playing the youngest child in a family growing up in the 1960s.

In the drama, Seo is the youngest (11-year-old) daughter to a bus driver, who has twin sisters and a slightly dim-witted brother. Although she has a loving father, she also receives the brunt of her stepmother’s frustrations.

While child actors don’t usually grab headlines when they are cast in drama series, Seo Shin-ae is one of the newest crop of scene-stealing kid stars. After debuting in 2004 in CFs, she already has several movie roles under her belt and worked with some high-profile adult actors, such as Park Shin-yang in Shiny Day and Jang Hyuk, Gong Hyo-jin, and Shin Goo in Thank You. Add her to the list of young actors to keep an eye on, joining others like Yoo Seung-ho and Shim Eun-kyung of Legend, Park Bo-young of King and I (although she’s growing out of the “child actor” label), and Kim Hyang-gi of When Night Comes.

Daily dramas really aren’t my cup of tea, but they tend to be good learning experiences for young or inexperienced actors since they shoot every day and offer more chance for growth than, say, much shorter miniseries. The drama will take to the airwaves after Big Sister finishes in mid-November.

Via OSEN

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