Name: Im Joo Hwan / Im Joo Hwan /
Profession: actor, model
Agency: Blossom Entertainment
Place of birth: South Korea
Height: 186 cm
Weight: 74 kg
Blood type: O
Education: Daejeon University (Faculty of Theatre and Film)
Hobbies: football, golf, fishing
Im Joo Hwan plays in theater and cinema. Participates in various TV shows.
After graduating from high school, he decided to become a model and was accepted into the agency The Men Management. His appearance and figure helped him reach certain heights in the business. Soon he began acting in dramas. The popularity of Zhu Hwang came very quickly, and he fell in love with both audiences and critics.
His interest and passion for acting began in elementary school when he joined the theater group Kwangto. It was a crucial moment in determining Im Joo Hwan's future career. He enjoyed, and passed through himself all the characters he portrayed not on stage.
Zhu Hwang made his debut in 2004 in the drama Magic.
In 2009, he played a major role in the drama “Thamna Island”.
He won the "Korean Folk Culture and Arts" contest for aspiring actors in 2009 for outstanding performances on the show. In addition, in the same year, he received critical acclaim for his poignant and refined performance of his role in the art drama Auction House. He played the role of a blind artist.
After Zhu Hwan's number of Japanese fans doubled, he appeared in the two-episode series War for Marriage. It tells the story of a Korean man and a Japanese woman who fell in love while working on a joint project, but faced backlash from families who strongly opposed their marriage.
In 2011, Im Joo Hwan returned to television, starring in the drama What Happened?, which tells the story of college students studying at the theater department. He played the main role of Jang Jae-hoon, a cynical outsider who is completely immersed in the world of musicals. He also played the role of a compassionate homeless man with Tourette's syndrome in the movie Suicide Forecast.
On May 17, 2011, Im Joo Hwan was enlisted in compulsory military service. During basic training, the actor fainted due to heart problems and was hospitalized for three months. Zhu Hwang continued the service, although he was asked to refuse for health reasons. Before the service began, Im Joo Hwan left Yedang Entertainment, which he had represented for several years. Demobilized on February 16, 2013.
The actor almost immediately returned to the entertainment industry, signing an exclusive contract for cooperation with the agency “Blossom Entertainment”.
He then played the lead role of a devoted brother in the drama My Ugly Brother. This drama became a turning point in the career of Im Zhu Hwan, the first post-army project that brought the actor great popularity. For the role of Gong Joon Soo, the director approved Im Joo Hwan in absentia, on recommendations and after watching his previous works. SBS was against Im Joo-hwan, but the director insisted that this actor is the real Gong Joon-soo. This story left no one indifferent, Gong Joon-soo, the man who loved his family more than anything in the world, despite the fact that his adopted brother and sister did not consider him a family, the sacrifice he gladly made for his family, and finally, the meeting with the girl for whom Gong Joon-soo became the only one in the world, the story of how a devoted “ugly brother” learned to love himself. Why "ugly"? Here it is a sign that you can not call a child beautiful, so that the gods do not envy and take him away from his parents. This drama played a big role in the personal life of Im Joo-hwan, as he says himself, it was Gong Joon-soo who showed him the value of the family and Im Joo-hwan became a much more caring and loving son and brother.
Very soon Im Zhu Hwan played a completely different role - the villain in the film "Specialists". He was the first character of this type in Im Joo Hwan’s career, and in 2015 he played the antagonist again, in the drama Oh My Ghost. The character of Im Joo Hwan is a policeman, outwardly he is incredibly attractive and kind and no one knows that he is actually possessed by a demon. Im Joo Hwang likes this role very much, he compared the work in this drama as walking on a slippery board, when one wrong step could spoil the entire drawing of the role. Im Joo Hwang did brilliantly, and, as the press wrote, “showed the darkness of his character with one eye movement.” For this role, the actor was nominated for an award as the best performance of a villain in a drama.
The next drama was the story of the fourth Prince Wang So and his brother, the eighth Prince, Wang Wook, "Shine or go mad." Again, Im Joo Hwan played well, showing the soulful throwing and doubts of his hero, the shining eighth prince.
In 2016, Im Joo-hwan played one of the main roles in the drama “Recklessly Lovers”, or even two roles, because Im Zhu-hwan’s hero lived two lives – on the one hand, he is the prosperous son of a rich family, and on the other, a poor unemployed guy, and this second life was necessary to get closer to the girl he loved.
In the drama Bride of the River God (2017), he played the role of Shin Hoo Ye, the director of the resort and, as it turns out, the god of fire. This role was noted by the audience and warmly received, Im Zhu Hwan brilliantly showed his hero and perfectly fit into the team of younger colleagues-actors.
In August 2018, he accepted the offer to play in the Special Drama: KBS2 "Such a Long Goodbye" the main male role - writer Bae Sang Hee, struggling to finish his second novel.
2019 was fruitful in the career of Im Joo Hwan, he played in the drama “Different Dreams”, timed to the centenary of the proclamation of the Declaration of Independence of Korea. Im Zhu Hwang played Japanese prosecutor Fukudu Saburo, embodying the image of a deeply decent and honest man who, despite his nationality, eventually goes over to the side of the Provisional Government of Korea.
Later, in the same 2019, Im Zhu Hwan played in a pair with Son Seung-hong in the comedy drama The Great Show and immediately received a new offer - in the drama Game: The Pursuit of Zero, where his partner was Ok Taek-yeon.
"Game: The Pursuit of Zero" (2020) turned out to be a complex and unusual project, it is not just a detective, but a psychological thriller and the story of pathologist Gu Do Gen, who was brilliantly played by Im Zhu Hwan, did not leave anyone indifferent. This hero cannot be called a villain, everything is much more complicated and the actor himself was very pleased with this role, he dreamed of such a hero for many years, to show not just a villain, but a villain-aesthetic who holds a scalpel and the fate of people in an elegant hand.
After "The Game" and such a controversial character as Gu Do Gen, Im Joo Hwan accepts an offer to play in the romantic comedy "The Spy Who Loved Me", and this is the first such experience in his career. His partners were Erik Moon and Yoo In Na, and together they showed the highest level of play.
Im Joo Hwang played Derek Hyun, an industrial spy who leads a double life, for everyone he is a brilliant diplomat and no one suspects his true identity. Again, Im Joo-hwan did a great job, proving that he was also a comedian. The Spies gave him, as an actor, many opportunities to show himself and his skills, which Im Joo Hwan demonstrated, and the result was a well-deserved award and recognition of critics and audiences.
Music video:
2017 - Miss You - Huh Gak
2006 - Key of Heart - BoA
Theatre:
A Streetcar Named Desire, Stanley, 2021
2002 - Our Town
2000 - The Good Doctor
Awards:
2020 - MBC Drama Awards - Excellent Actor (for his role in Game: Going to Zero, The Spy Who Loved Me)
2019 - 14th Asia Model Awards: Korean Model Star
2015 - 4th Annual DramaFever Awards: Nominated for Best Villain Award
2013 - SBS Drama Awards: A New Star (My Ugly Brother)
2009 - 17th Korean Culture and Entertainment Awards: Best New Actor (Tamra, the Island)