Lee Sung Hyung, who played a clown in Dead-End Job, looked back on the moment he brought the character to life.
Lee recently sat down with iMBC Entertainment at the MBC headquarters in Seoul for an interview about Netflix’s original series Dead-End Job.
Set at a strange temp agency that advertises only “dream jobs” paying at least 50 times the usual hourly wage, Dead-End Job is a survival-horror series about young people sent to nightmarish workplaces to make a living.
Lee appeared as a clown in the series’ second episode. Alongside special guest star Yoon Kyung Ho, he played a central role in creating the episode’s eerie, bizarre story.
Lee said he had not originally been expected to play the clown. “I was contacted about playing a coach who teaches an actor to juggle. A few days later, they got in touch again and asked whether I would consider appearing in the show instead. I’d never acted for the screen before, so I worried about whether I could do it. I thought about it all night,” he recalled.
His wife’s encouragement changed his mind. “She told me, ‘It’s a rare opportunity, so you should do it for the experience.’ I auditioned, got the part, and became the clown in Dead-End Job,’” he said.
Lee also recalled the makeup process. “I’ve been performing for about 23 years, but it had been a long time since I’d worn clown makeup like that. I only used to paint my face when I was a beginner. Even I found it unsettling when I saw myself in the makeup,” he said with a laugh.
He added, “For the first and second versions of the clown, I think I watched a lot of dog videos. He’s a curious character who keeps looking around, never knowing where he’ll go next. For the third version, I shaped the character to feel beyond good and evil, almost inhuman.”
He also discussed the much-talked-about kimbap-eating scene. “We made almost all of it without CGI. The swelling belly after eating the kimbap was done with a balloon, too. And the kimbap was wrapped in edible foil,” Lee explained.
He laughed as he recalled one viewer comment: “I found it funny when someone wrote, ‘That clown is a gentleman; he ate after paying.’”
Since its release, Dead-End Job has amassed 25.4 million viewing hours and five million views in just three days. It ranked fourth on the global Top 10 list for non-English shows. The series also claimed the No. 1 spot among today’s Top 10 series in South Korea immediately after its release and made the Top 10 lists in 51 countries, including Brazil, Egypt, France, Germany, Hong Kong, India, Italy, Malaysia, Mexico, the Philippines, Saudi Arabia and Thailand.
Dead-End Job premiered on Netflix on the 30th of last month.
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