I Acted Once, and Now They Call Me a Genius - Chapter 146

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Team. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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Episode 146

Entertainment Live is an extremely aggressive interview show.

Here, “aggressive” means aggressive “in a broadcasting sense.”

It’s like a kind of concept.

The MC tries to torment the guest in every way possible, and the guest must somehow escape from that MC’s barrage of arrows.

And the one hosting this show was Yun Gi-sang.

A comedian who proudly carves his name in the upper ranks whenever the public ranks unlikable celebrities.

People often raised questions. How could this program last for 10 years when both the program and MC had such poor public perception?

Yun Gi-sang thought like this.

‘Because it gets ratings.’

Celebrities who you normally can’t even meet, let alone get close to, at least on this program get pathetically ruined and put in difficult situations.

The stimulation provided by this sadistic structure could never be found in ordinary interview programs.

Sometimes people would sarcastically ask if it felt good to appear on TV by trampling on people.

But Yun Gi-sang had his own pride in this program. Making someone suffer and humiliating them wasn’t actually an easy task either.

Just today, Yun Gi-sang spent all of yesterday studying about the actors from [Red Zone] for today’s interview.

Thanks to that, he was able to find out.

That Do-won had been following Yoo Chan-woo around for a while to appear in his movie.

But ultimately, Yoo Chan-woo’s leading role went to an unknown newcomer named Cha Do-young.

And even that Do-young and Seon-woo here were from the same theater troupe.

“Ah, if you’re worried Do-won might hear, just tell me. I absolutely won’t say anything!”

Yun Gi-sang joked around and comically brought his hand to his ear.

This was also his know-how, if you could call it that. Asking uncomfortable questions in a comical way. This way, he could somewhat block both the other party’s room to get angry and viewers’ room to attack.

Constantly walking the line while cornering the other party so they had no escape route.

‘How will he react?’

Usually newcomers tend to freeze up when put in this kind of situation.

Because whatever they say tends to put them in an awkward position. But Seon-woo…

“There’s nothing different for me.”

“Oh? Nothing different?”

“Yes. Both of them are my most beloved seniors.”

He showed quite a cunning response.

Suddenly trying to compare Do-won and Do-young. It was an unexpected question, but Seon-woo decided to take the straightforward approach.

Just speaking his true feelings.

True feelings that wouldn’t be problematic no matter who heard them.

Seon-woo analyzes characters’ psychology every day.

Compared to humans expressed in text, analyzing the psychology of a person right in front of him was actually easier in some ways.

Expressions, voice, gaze… there were so many clues to analyze their heart.

Thanks to that, he could roughly tell what kind of person Yun Gi-sang was.

‘As long as there’s broadcasting entertainment value, he’ll do anything.’

This person probably approaches almost every interview with this attitude.

It’s not that he has malicious intent. It’s just that as long as he can extract entertainment, whatever happens in the process doesn’t really matter to him.

Honestly, it wasn’t very pleasant.

Not because he was playing tricks on him. It was a bit uncomfortable that he specifically mentioned Do-won and Do-young. If Do-won had even made it to the candidate list for Yoo Chan-woo’s work, he could roughly guess how much Do-won wanted to do that project… turning this into a laughing matter like this seemed too much.

Even if the program’s concept was like this…

“Oh, would this kind of question be a bit childish…? Ah, whatever. Which of the two seniors do you think you’re closer to?”

Hearing this kind of question was definitely troublesome.

…This is a trap no matter how I answer.

‘Should I just show some embarrassment appropriately and end it?’

That wouldn’t be difficult.

But he wasn’t very happy about Do-young and Do-won being constantly compared like this. First, he didn’t want to talk about someone who wasn’t present, and it was too rude to Do-won.

Seon-woo thought for a moment.

What should he do? How could he deal with this kind of person without getting caught up and maintain his own pace?

Right at that moment, someone came to mind in Seon-woo’s head.

And the moment he thought of him, Seon-woo immediately burst a color orb without hesitation.

Specifically,

“Of course, I like our Professor Lee Hyeok more.”

Yoon-seo’s color orb.

Seon-woo’s lips, which had been slightly stiff until just moments ago, drew a gentle smile.

A clear, pure smile that made one’s heart feel at ease just by looking at it.

Perhaps people with good eyes might have noticed that it resembled Yoon-seo’s smile from the drama.

‘This is my first time acting in daily life.’

But right now, he needed Yoon-seo’s gentle yet firm nature.

Seon-woo wasn’t the type to naturally deflect this kind of mischief, but Yoon-seo was different.

“Our professor really took good care of us during [Red Zone] filming. He bought us meals often too.”

“Haha, you were won over by food?”

Yun Gi-sang smiled with his eyes and nodded his head.

While inwardly letting out admiration.

‘Huh, look at this kid?’

Usually when he crossed the line, the other person’s reaction was one of two things.

Push him away, or run away.

But Seon-woo acted as if he was completely unaware of it all. As if Yun Gi-sang hadn’t crossed any line. No, maybe as if there had never been any line to begin with.

An interesting character.

But that was fine.

He still had plenty of provocative questions prepared.

Right now…

“Seon-woo, honestly tell me. The way you looked at Min-hee during your acting scenes was quite intense… Have you ever actually felt your heart flutter or anything like that?”

Even this was like that.

Yun Gi-sang once again wore that good-natured, innocent smile across his face. It was one of his know-how techniques. The more wicked the question, the more virtuous expression he’d make.

Then the other person couldn’t even get angry and would become even more flustered.

…But then,

“My heart? Of course it’s always shaken.”

“…Excuse me?”

The one who was actually flustered was Yun Gi-sang.

No, this kind of reaction wasn’t in his expectations. Wasn’t the normal picture supposed to be Seon-woo denying it, and Yun Gi-sang continuing to corner him?

Was there a male actor who would calmly say he fell for a female actress on live TV? Wasn’t this a broadcast accident?

Even Yun Gi-sang was momentarily speechless at this unrealistic answer. What do you do when someone nods their head to a question they were supposed to deny?

But Seon-woo looked back at Min-hee with a shameless expression.

“Ever since I saw So-hee doing CPR, it’s been like that. I could feel that she genuinely cared about the patient… Honestly, it was quite a plot twist.”

“…No, wait a minute. You’re not talking about the work right now!”

“Oh, ah. Yes. I’m sorry. I naturally thought you were talking about the work.”

Was this… high-level skill?

The way he naturally kept changing the topic with such an innocent feeling was so natural that it was hard to find fault with it.

Yun Gi-sang gripped his cue sheet tightly.

Realizing that as a 10-year veteran of entertainment live shows, he was facing a formidable opponent of a type he’d never seen before.

‘…I can’t lose.’

A comedian was someone who made a living with words and wit.

At least on his home ground, he couldn’t be pushed around by a rookie actor.

However,

“Your unrequited love acting was very realistic. Have you ever had unrequited love? Or are you having one now?”

“Oh. How did you know? I do have someone I’m having unrequited love for right now.”

“…”

Seon-woo was more shameless than expected.

Even more,

“There’s talk that Do-won is a very strict senior. Have you been scolded recently?”

Even to this kind of question,

“Oh, of course. I got scolded earlier too.”

“Oh! For what?”

“He told me to stop freezing up in front of patients.”

“…No, so that’s also a story from the show!”

What do you do when he answers like this?

Yun Gi-sang laughed awkwardly while lamenting inwardly.

Clearly when he investigated Seon-woo yesterday…

‘There was no information about him being such a lunatic.’

He had to acknowledge what needed to be acknowledged.

It was a complete defeat. Yun Gi-sang had no confidence he could break Seon-woo’s pace.

Then he had no choice but to change targets.

Yun Gi-sang looked at Do-won.

That Do-won had a prickly personality was something everyone who knew him was aware of. Of course, his personality was quite nasty because of that, so normally he wouldn’t bother to provoke him…

‘At this rate, there won’t be enough stimulation!’

He would throw mischievous jokes, and the other person would get flustered.

The value of entertainment live shows was right there.

As such, he had tried to bully the easy newcomer, but if that didn’t work… he had no choice but to provoke Do-won even if it was him!

“Do-won. Um… in the show, the relationship between Yoon-seo and Lee Hyeok is very complicated, right? Like acknowledging yet not acknowledging each other. How is it in reality? What kind of junior is Seon-woo?”

It might be an ordinary question. It could even be a question that would induce a heartwarming answer.

But if the target was Do-won, the case was different.

That Do-won couldn’t say embarrassing things was a fact everyone who knew him was aware of.

If he induced praise like this, he might get disgusted and shake his head instead.

Compared to rookies falling into panic, it might be less entertaining, but shouldn’t he at least salvage a scene like this?

Indeed, just hearing that question seemed to upset him as Do-won’s eyebrows twitched.

And he answered without hesitation.

“He’s a good junior.”

“…What?”

“He’s a friend who always does better than I expect. He falls a bit short of what I hope for, but that’s because my expectations are so high.”

At those words, Yun Gi-sang looked at Do-won with a dazed expression.

Had he heard that correctly?

That Do-won just complimented his junior, right? Just in the last project, he said to a junior with considerable experience, “This kid thinks he’s good. He needs to get a proper scolding once.”

But one consoling thing was that it wasn’t just Yun Gi-sang who was stunned right now.

Everyone who heard Do-won’s words had their eyes wide open.

Their expressions seemed to say, has that person gone crazy?

Even seeing Seon-woo, who had been so unshakeable, now showing clear bewilderment on his face, Yun Gi-sang thought.

…Is this also a success of sorts?

* * *

“Phew, everyone worked hard.”

As soon as the interview ended, Seo Ryeong patted Min-hee and Seon-woo’s shoulders.

Then he glared at where Yun Gi-sang had been and muttered.

“How is that guy so appetite-killing every time I see him? Are you okay? You’re not hurt, are you?”

“Ah, no! I’m fine, senior.”

“…Senior? You called me sister yesterday, why are you calling me senior again?”

“That was because I was drunk…”

“Call me sister!”

Just when Min-hee thought she had barely escaped Yun Gi-sang’s barrage of questions, now she was caught up in sister-fighting again.

Do-won looked at the two of them, sighed, then turned to look at Seon-woo.

“Kim Seon-woo.”

“Ah, yes.”

“You did better in the interview than I expected. Given your personality, I thought you’d stammer or say something unnecessarily serious.”

“…Actually, I feel like I just said a bunch of useless things.”

Seon-woo answered with an embarrassed voice.

From the moment he burst Yoon-seo’s color orb, Seon-woo’s strategy was set. Confidently talking nonsense with sincerity.

In some ways, his attitude toward the interview might not have been proper, but the interview itself was ridiculous to begin with, so what could he do?

Rather, Seon-woo was surprised looking at Do-won.

Considering his usual personality, it wouldn’t have been strange for him to have a big fight with Yun Gi-sang, live broadcast or not…

“Still, someone like that is decent. At least he doesn’t cross the line.”

“…I thought that level had already crossed the line by far.”

“It’s just at the level of ‘how can I mess with him once?’ As you continue your entertainment career, you’ll come to know. You’ll often see guys who make you think, ‘I’ve done nothing wrong to this person, so why is this bastard trying to kill me?'”

“That’s quite sad.”

“That’s what reality is like.”

“…Um, senior.”

“What.”

“What you said in the interview earlier.”

“Which thing.”

“About me being a good junior and having high expectations.”

Seon-woo stared intently at Do-won.

“Did you mean that sincerely?”

“…Usually people don’t ask about that kind of thing separately, do they?”

“Um, I’m sorry.”

“It’s sincere that you don’t meet my expectations.”

You don’t meet expectations.

In other words, it meant the expectations were high.

The moment Seon-woo’s expression became a bit subtle, Do-won glared at him.

“And you. Why did you lie in the interview?”

“What?”

“I’ve never bought you rice.”

Never bought rice?

Ah. Seon-woo finally remembered.

When asked who he was closer to between Do-young and Do-won, he answered that he was on Do-won’s side because Do-won had been buying him a lot of rice lately.

Do-won looked at Seon-woo and spoke.

“What time is your call tomorrow?”

“I go in at 1 PM.”

“Perfect. Let’s watch a movie together in the morning. And I’ll buy you rice.”

“A movie?”

“The one with your senior. ‘The Ladder of Eden’. It opens tomorrow.”

Ah. Seon-woo nodded.

However, there was one small problem.

“But I… I promised to watch it with the troupe members.”

“…”

Murderous intent flashed in Do-won’s eyes.

Seon-woo hastily added.

“But a good movie is even better when watched twice! I’ll book the tickets!”

He had to survive.

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Team. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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