Free Web Novel“How could I know something you don’t? Where did you come from?”
“Well, I can’t really remember. It felt like a very dark place.”
Yoomyeong’s gaze drifted into the distance as his voice rang softly. Seon-ha realized that this guy was not simply throwing lines back at her, but actually acting.
‘Did he already establish a character from just a few exchanged lines?’
He was even faithfully adhering to the format of the task, [Contradiction].
“There’s no dark place around here. Darkness is scary.”
“I’m not scared. I cultivated my strength in the darkness.”
“Strength? You look rather frail. You don’t seem like someone with any strength.”
“Strength isn’t only about violence. I have the power to fly.”
“The power to fly?”
Oops.
Seon-ha had forgotten to contradict him first.
The line he had improvised, the character he had created on the spot, was so convincing that it carried a strange sense of pride and fulfillment. Seon-ha, absorbed in listening to those emotions, forgot it was an exercise and instinctively asked him a question instead.
As Seon-ha raised her hand first in surrender, Yoomyeong also ended the contradiction and answered with a bright smile.
“Yes. Thanks to you, I remembered. I know now. I’m a butterfly.”
It was a one act play completed in an instant.
The members could only stare speechlessly at the quick wit and creativity of the fellow actor who had only just appeared at Oedipus.
Only Seon-ha extended her hand with a broad smile.
“Young actor, you’re quite an entertaining performer.”
The individual assignments focused on characterization.
The body workshops focused on optimizing physical balance.
The two person groups were designed to encourage intense empathy and draw out genuine emotion.
The four person groups were meant to maximize image and creativity through collaboration.
As they carried out all kinds of exercises together, the Oedipus members gradually began admiring Yoomyeong.
“That Shin Yoomyeong guy is seriously mysterious.”
“Yeah. But doesn’t he grow on you the more you see him? At first, when he was yelling at Yu-ri, I thought he was arrogant, but surprisingly, he’s actually pretty decent.”
“Yeah. He quietly helped me out when I was having trouble earlier.”
“Sometimes I get annoyed thinking God really favors Yoomyeong. How can someone who only started acting this year have no weaknesses in assignments?”
“But he works insanely hard too. He knew the script so well, so I asked how, and he said he had always wanted to act but never had the opportunity, so he spent day and night reading scripts and practicing alone.”
“Ah, really? Usually learning acting from books feels awkward, but that’s impressive.”
Yoomyeong’s impression of Oedipus was also gradually changing.
“Senior, shouldn’t the tempo there be one-two instead of one-two-three?”
“Hm? You’re right. Sorry, let’s try again.”
Unlike Changcheon, there was no authoritarian behavior between seniors and juniors. People freely offered opinions and discussed things openly. To Yoomyeong, who was accustomed to the deeply rooted hierarchy of the theater world, it felt refreshingly unfamiliar.
“I was struggling with turns during yesterday’s body balance workshop. Could you take a look when you have time?”
“Yes, of course.”
There were many genuinely hardworking actors there, and they were open-minded enough to ask others for help. Which also meant they were ready to help others in return.
Little by little, Yoomyeong began to understand why Oedipus’s seniors cared enough to carve time out of their busy schedules for the workshops, and why Seo Ryu Shin spoke so passionately about the charm of Oedipus.
Even to the very last person.
“Oh, you’re early.”
“Yes.”
Although Seon Yu-ri was still cold toward him, Yoomyeong gradually found himself warming to her as well.
As the person in charge of the workshop, she was always the first to arrive and the last to leave, working diligently the entire time. She rarely asked others for help. She seemed like the type who tried to handle all of her responsibilities herself whenever possible.
The floor where the actors sprawled about was always spotless, and the drinks for the seniors were replaced with fresh ones every hour. Behind all of it was Seon Yu-ri, quietly moving around alone, taking care of everything with unobtrusive efficiency.
An actor who struggled. Someone unsophisticated, not good with flattering words.
Even Yoomyeong found it difficult to dislike an actor like that.
“Ah—”
Yu-ri gave only a brief response before resuming her vocal exercises. Hearing that, Yoomyeong took the initiative to extend an olive branch.
“Belting isn’t always the answer. Try using a mixed voice during vocalization. I think it would deliver the dialogue better and produce a nicer tone.”
It was something he had wanted to say every time he watched Seon Yu-ri practice. In the early 2000s, there was a widespread misconception that belting was the only proper way to project one’s voice on stage. Later, acting theory developed considerably, and perspectives emerged suggesting that different methods suited different people.
However, the response to his advice was unexpectedly sharp.
“Do answers always come to you that easily? It must be nice.”
Vocalization.
Before entering university, Yu-ri had appeared in various films and dramas following the success of .
Vocalization had never been a problem for broadcast acting, where audio was recorded separately. But once she entered theater, it became a major obstacle.
One of the fundamentals of theatrical vocalization was belting.
True to her personality of overcoming problems through effort, Yu-ri practiced relentlessly. Eventually, she succeeded in implementing belting itself, but the problem was the resulting sound.
Her clear, sharp voice, which suited her appearance perfectly, lost much of its charm when she used belting. The delivery of her lines also became duller than when she spoke naturally.
“Ah— Eh— Ih— Oh— Uh—” ƒrēewebnoѵёl.cσm
Yu-ri always arrived at the practice room first, endlessly raising and lowering her pitch, trying to soften it, sharpen it, experimenting with every possible technique. She improved somewhat, but vocalization remained her weakness.
Last fall, because of it, she lost the lead role in Oedipus’s production of to Hye-Seon.
Yu-ri lacked nothing in acting experience, focus, or skill, but since the fall production was held in a large theater, the charm and projection of the actor’s voice were also crucial. At the time, the director concluded that Yu-ri’s vocalization simply did not suit Juliet.
Afterward, through repeated practice, she finally managed to land the role of Ophelia in this spring’s production of “Hamlet.” But she knew the truth. Since it was a small theater production, her natural voice could still reach the back seats even without fully relying on belting.
Her agency, which had agreed to let her take a hiatus during university, constantly contacted her, urging her to return.
— What’s the issue? If you return to screen acting, this won’t matter at all.
— That’s exactly the problem. I know I can’t do it.
— You’re not even planning to continue theater after graduation, and it’s a minor genre anyway. It just doesn’t suit you. Let’s quickly find a comeback project... Should I send over some scripts we’ve received?
— No.
But Yu-ri refused.
Not being able to do something and choosing not to do it were completely different matters.
Becoming an actress who only worked in film and television because she couldn’t handle theatrical vocalization would leave a permanent scar on Yu-ri’s pride. It was directly tied to her identity as an actress.
That was why she became angry when he casually offered advice about something she struggled with and practiced every single day.
“When it comes to assignments or acting, do answers always come to you that easily? If you just practice the solution, does everything instantly work out? Being a genius must make life so easy.”
Without responding to Yu-ri’s sharp words, Yoomyeong quietly turned around. Before leaving, he added one final sentence.
“No ◈ Nоvеlіgһт ◈ (Continue reading) one knows what others are going through. There are no soliloquies or dialogues in real life.”
For a brief moment, she almost called him back to apologize.
“We’re not even close, and just because you’ve seen me practice a few times doesn’t mean you know anything,” she muttered to herself.
“Ah— Eh— Ih— Oh— Uh—”
“Ah— Eh— Ih— Oh— Uh—”
After practicing belting for quite a while that day, Yu-ri finished her scheduled training and began cleaning the auditorium. As she swept the floor with a broom, she remembered what he had said earlier.
— There are no soliloquies or dialogues in real life.
The reason his words had struck her so deeply was because they resonated painfully well with her own experiences. To win the role in , the young Yu-ri had practiced for days without sleep before finally earning the part. And the very first response she received afterward was:
— She’s pretty, so her life must be easy~
And the same thing happened later, when she continued studying while acting, took the college entrance exam like everyone else, and proudly passed the acting department entrance exam for a national university.
— She got in through the actor special admissions, huh? Some of us studied ourselves to death sixteen hours a day to get in.
It upset her. Even so, she couldn’t run around grabbing every person by the collar to explain that it wasn’t true, that she had earned everything through her own abilities.
‘How convenient it would be if there were soliloquies and dialogues in real life. Then there wouldn’t be any misunderstandings in the world.’
As Yu-ri swept the floor with that thought in mind, she suddenly froze in the middle of the auditorium.
‘Am I making those same misunderstandings?’
She didn’t know him. All she knew was that he was a rookie actor, so she had assumed that no matter how hard he practiced, the total amount of time he had invested could never compare to hers.
But did she really know his circumstances?
Was she any different from the people who dismissed her efforts because of her ‘pretty face’ or her ‘celebrity status’?
Her body stiffened. Having unexpectedly discovered her own flaws, her face flushed bright red.
After a moment, she cautiously tried projecting her voice again. Recalling the section on ‘head voice’ from the vocalization book she had memorized, she opened her throat, gradually closed her larynx, and let her breath resonate.
Ah—
Then she turned that sound into a line and pushed it outward with her diaphragm.
“Romeo, wherefore art thou Romeo?”
Ah...
It was much easier.
Her voice came out clear and straight, exactly like her natural tone.
She had always been taught that the proper path in theatrical vocalization was belting, so she still felt anxious about whether this method was acceptable. Yet her voice, fuller and more resonant than before, echoed throughout the empty auditorium.
“Wow, Yu-ri, your voice sounds better. Did you finally find the right method?”
Hye-Seon, who had just arrived, praised her.
Yu-ri lowered her head, her guilt growing heavier.
Yoon Hansung.
The final instructor and the most popular among the invited senior actors, possessing overwhelming star power.
Everyone’s eyes sparkled.
‘Hmm, so that’s him. His style seems decent enough, but he lacks the presence I saw on screen...’
Hansung subtly glanced toward Yoomyeong before beginning to speak.
“Hello. I’m actor Yoon Hansung.”
“Hello—!”
“Today, I plan to conduct a workshop on emotional immersion. Though I’m not sure I’m really qualified for it.”
“Ooh— BJ! BJ!”
The juniors cheered while calling out his nickname in playful teasing. The atmosphere was unexpectedly casual.
“I really don’t like that nickname. It makes it sound like I can only do tragic acting.”
“Hahaha—”
“Yes, well, I am known for sorrowful performances. I think that comes from the authenticity of emotion. Audiences are surprisingly perceptive. Even though they know it’s acting, the moment they feel the emotions aren’t genuine, they immediately lose interest. So where does authentic emotion come from?”
Hansung looked around at the juniors.
“I believe an actor’s life experiences play a huge role. Actors who have experienced many hardships tend to express emotions more richly. As you probably know, my own life has not been smooth.”
He gave a self-deprecating smile.
His impoverished childhood, his long years of obscurity, and the death of his young daughter. His painful past had now been repackaged into a story of overcoming adversity through fame, becoming the subject of countless articles. Even the resentment he felt toward journalists deepened his emotional range.
“But that doesn’t mean you need to contract an incurable disease or lose someone close to become a good actor. When you were sad, did you truly immerse yourself in that sadness? Your greatest joy, your greatest sorrow, your greatest anger. The practice of deeply savoring those emotions and broadening the range of feeling you can express is called ‘Emotional Maximization.’” frёewebnoѵēl.com
[Emotional Maximization]
He wrote the phrase on the auditorium blackboard, set down the marker, and warned the students.
“Today is going to be difficult.”
