I thought Lee Young-ae turned down personal interviews because she was rumoured to be dating her director Park Chan-wook.

I'm not sure what's to be gained with a documentary, unless she's promoting her charity work. Like you mentioned, she's still a perennial on CFs and apparently she's still promoting Dae Jang Geum to farther parts of the world.

@belleza: STILL promoting dae jang geum?! for real? wow.

"STILL promoting dae jang geum?! for real? "

Yup. Whenever DJG enters a new market and performs well, you can expect Lee Young Ae to pack up her hanbok and say "anyonghaseyo!" to the newly initiated country. There's a 2007 or 2008 clip of her being interviewed by Iranian TV. Also, I think this year she made a stop in Africa, when it did well there.

Dae Jang Geum right now is getting significant promotion in Europe. It was especially a big hit in Hungary.

My Hallyu dream scenario was for DJG to blow up so much in America that the Wu Tang would release a tribute album, "The Jewels of My Palace" Da Wu-oppas say "Anyonghaseyo bitches!! "

Interesting, I'd like to see that. She's so... different.

I actually hadn't heard about her on Infinity Challenge, either. Gotta go look that one up.

@ belleza
But PCW has a wife and a 12yo daughter. So he and LYA were rumored to be having an affair? Whoa~~ Never heard that one, I thought she had a squeaky clean image.

"But PCW has a wife and a 12yo daughter. So he and LYA were rumored to be having an affair? "

I have no idea, actually. I read about that rumour a few years ago and kinda dismissed it. Lee Young Ae is good at image control (though allegdly in college she inhaled.) The only thing I hear about her is that she's (like Lee Byung Hung) intense onset, and if you're not on point, she'll tear you apart.

I think LYA is obviously, really thankful for DJG, but I think she kinda has an ambivalent attitude toward the show. In fact, she herself thought Jang Geum was a little self-righteous and actually empathized more with her rivals. After doing One Fine Spring Day and prior to Jang Geum, Young Ae had actually wanted to slow down her career. She turned down the Winter Sonata role (original story would have had her instead of BYJ as the amnesiac) and wanted to take a long break. When she was given the script for Dang Jang Geun, she loved it but resisted doing the role due to the demanding nature of sageuks. It should be noted that the proposed storyline for Dang Jang Geum was perhaps not exactly what she initially signed up for. Originally, the Madam Han character was intended to be only in 7-10 episodes or so. However, she was so popular that they heavily rewrote the storyline to have their relationship encompass about half of the series run (and it's really the surrogate mother-daughter storyline -- the heart of Confucian beliefs -- that really spoke to the Chinese audiences.) That in turn meant the romantic triangle between Jang Geum, Jung Ho, and the king -- which was meant to take over the show -- was significantly compromised and treated as a bookmark. Critical reception for Jang Geum was good, but they were mixed over Lee Young Ae's acting (which itself had been a point of contention through most of her career prior to JSA, One Fine Spring Day, etc.) and credited the show's popularity more to the storyline than her. That hurt Lee Young Ae a lot, and it motivated her to do Sympathy for a Lady Vengeance, which can be interpreted as meta on Young Ae's Jang Geum persona. Young Ae isn't reclusive per se, but she expressed that Jang Geum was much bigger than herself and it's difficult for her to live up to it, be it commercially or personally.

lee da hae also has a CF Queen because she have many also commercials, Lee young ae she's not only a cf queen but also lee da hae.

wow belle, you know so much!

thanks for sharing the interesting info/rumor/gossip! :)

@ chai, actually not only lee da hae acted in many cf.. ok? in fact, kimtae hee has more cfs than ldh and also known s cf queen. but we're talking about lya here, s she has around 240 (O_o) cfs. whats the problem with this ldh's fan?...

anyway, i really think dae jang geum is the first drama that started korean wave. i started to have interest in korean culture after watching djg. the storyline itself was superbly great, the costume, the scenery, the food itself and everything is so great. thumbs up for djg. =)

She was awesome in Lady Vengeance. Loved her red eye shadow.

salt

hay lee

@ chai : lee da hee ?? only you who said LDH is a CF Queen hahhaha?? LDH still to far being CF Queen She even haven't surpasses lee na young.. LYA maybe 240 video commercial,, so far CF queen is KTh ==> by product, then Jeon ji hyun, lee young Ae , han ga in

this woman who has lot of CF then a good acting skill. has she married already ??

lee young ae you are a good actresse and you can do all the rools i ike you and you rools in dae jeong geum is veryyyyyyyy nice and good

Oh so was she really dating Park Chan Wook =D That is interesting to hear although it sounds sort of groundless lol. She has such a nice public image that makes it difficult to believe rumours about her.

That Infinity Challenge thing is sure funny. MC Yu and his comrades were acting like fools in front of her lol.

And still she looks adorable in her late-30s. Wonder when she'll get married.

oh you are so beautifful you have a baby face and i like you

hi.
I am iranan
ilove very very love lee young ae...very

Dae jang geum is on my all-time favourite dramas list (whish is not long , and of course include winter sonata )

its one of the rare old besties , where dramas were made with real passion , not the recent crap
, although I only watched DJG this year ! ,
Lee young ae is incredibly talented and I sooooo respect her as an actress ...