Close Up with Ahn Hyo Seop
This Canadian Korean was surprised by a phone call he received while living in Toronto, but it took the then 17 year old Paul Ahn back to Korea after a ten year absence. What was the mysterious call about?
To come and be a trainee at JYP. He still isn’t sure how they got his number but was excited for the chance. He went over by himself and became a trainee living and training with the now popular members of the group Got7.
So what happened you may ask?
Why did this actor/singer/dancer who plays piano, guitar, mandolin, and violin not debut with the rest as Got8?
As you can see in the clip from KBS Happy Together he humbly says his skills weren’t good enough but his biggest disqualification was his height. At 187cm (almost 6’2”) he was 10cm taller than the average Got7 member, which doesn’t seem to matter at other agencies but did at JYP Entertainment. Ahn Hyo Seop said he never hated being tall before that and wished for a time he was shorter.
However, he didn’t let that disappointment hold him back. He quickly found a place at Starhaus Entertainment and less than a month after Got7’s debut, he released a single with a new group, One O One, which consists of fellow Starhaus actors. With in two months he had a role in his first drama, Splash Splash Love, and became a cast member on a music variety program called Always Cantare.
After some other support roles he got his first lead role in Queen of the Ring. His role in the hit family drama Father is Strange propelled him into the public eye and lead to further popular dramas like Top Management, 30 but 17 and Abyss.
He really noticed his own popularity grow during his recent drama Dr. Romantic 2. As he was surprised by the sudden increase in followers on his Instagram page @imhyoseop (which is now over 2.6 million). The success of Dr. Romantic 2 also meant he had to keep his ratings promise, which was to do a duet with co-star Lee Sung Kyung, if the ratings went to double digits. This happened in the first episode and it continued rising until by the final episode it was nearly 30% viewership nation wide.
He performed at the 2018 SBS Drama Awards ceremony (where he won Best New Actor) for his role in 30 but 17. The performance was with his rowing team co-stars for the year end ceremony. He began by showing his violin skills and they then went on to rap and dance. We have his violin solo below but you can check out the full performance here
So he does well at the violin, how about his dancing.
He says he likes piano the most but isn’t very good. Only good enough to play some chords as he sings in Korean.
And in English
He uses guitar accompaniment as well, like in this clip from Instyle TV.
They employed his piano and mandolin skills in the YouTube drama Top Management where he became a member of the group S.O.U.L.
He said he isn’t the type to feel lonely even though his family is in Canada as he fills his downtime with books, food, and sleep.
It will be interesting to see what this multi-talented star does in the future. To finish we will leave you with the S.O.U.L. music video (with his costars Cha EunWoo, Jung Yuan, and Bang JaeMin from the drama Top Management)