“I will say there is a catharsis you feel as an actor when you’re expressing such rage and sadness. It’s almost an explosive quality. I never know what’s going to happen because I can’t predict how that’s going to come out of me.”
Lee deliberately sought out her role in Phantom after years of taking parts in comedies – when 2019’s Extreme Job became a surprise hit, she continued making lighter films.
“I wanted to cool down that comedy streak,” she says. “I wanted to go back to what I wanted to do. I was instinctively attracted to Phantom because it was very much in the shadows. It had layers of sorrow.”
“For me, the biggest sorrow you can feel is the loss of a loved one,” she adds.
“When you think about when Phantom takes place, it’s a period of unrelenting sorrow and loss. The era of Japanese colonisation for Koreans was a time of seeing people shot in the streets daily.
“Tragedy was part of everyday life. So when performing, I really tried to think of what it would feel like for your day-to-day life to be so soaked in tragedy.”
Lee Hanee (centre) takes the stage to receive the Best from the East award for outstanding performance at the New York Asian Film Festival in July 2023. Photo: Gavin Li
Since winning the Miss Korea beauty pageant in 2006, Lee has built a solid career in entertainment. She is a classically trained musician who plays the gayageum, or plucked zither, and has performed in New York’s Carnegie Hall.
She has also been a TV host and a musical theatre star in addition to her work in drama and comedies.
Right before Phantom, Lee filmed Killing Romance, which has turned out to be another surprise hit.
As Yeo-rae, the star of the most expensive flop in the history of South Korean film, Lee is a consistent delight in the film. She sings, dances, appears in commercials for soda and clothes, and plots the murder of her husband, Jonathan (Lee Sun-kyun), with Bum-woo (Gong Myoung), a super fan who lives next door.
“I think Killing Romance had a unique attitude that is unlike [other] movies in South Korea or the rest of the world,” she says. “It offers a constellation of perspectives and points of view. You can identify with any of the characters, depending on whose journey you feel like following that day.”
During our interview, the actress switches back and forth from English to Korean, turning to the translator to help flesh out her comments about the leads in Killing Romance.
Lee Sun-kyun (centre) as Jonathan and Lee Hanee (right) in a still from “Killing Romance”.
She calls Jonathan a villain, but a charming one audiences find appealing.
“Anyone in their lives at some point has thought, ‘Am I a loser?’ That’s what connects viewers with Bum-woo,” she adds.
Lee appears frequently in advertisements in South Korea, so she had no trouble tackling the at-times absurd bits in Killing Romance. In trying to balance commercial projects with artistic ones, she has found parallels with Yeo-rae’s struggles.
“Being an actor, sometimes you have a sort of agency in your life, and sometimes it’s a passive profession where you have to be chosen in order to do a job,” she says.
Lee Hanee (second from left) at the New York Asian Film Festival in July 2023. Photo: Gavin Li
“I think there are two types of celebrities: those like Yeo-rae, who go along with what the public wants and tries to meet their expectations, and then those who try to follow their instincts into projects they find rewarding. It’s a challenge I always need to be mindful of.”
Lee will next be working on two period dramas, including one for Netflix called Emma, set in the 1970s and ’80s.
Want more articles like this? Follow SCMP Film on Facebook