"Cursing and frostbite made my nails fall off"... Kim Hye-yoon opens up about 7 years in obscurity

[Financial News] Actress Kim Hye-yoon has opened up about the hardships she endured while working in minor roles for as long as seven years.
In episode 327 of the tvN variety show "You Quiz on the Block" (hereafter "You Quiz"), which aired on the 14th, actress Kim Hye-yoon appeared as a guest and showed off her candid storytelling.
On the show, Kim Hye-yoon recalled that back when she was still unknown, she was once criticized on set with remarks like, "What’s the point of having good diction if you can’t act properly? That’s why you’re an amateur."
Kim Hye-yoon said that even amid frequent scolding, she tried to steady herself, explaining, "To be honest, if you really listen, what they said wasn’t entirely wrong. I’d think, ‘I mean, I am an amateur.’ If I turned it into, ‘I got scolded, I’m so intimidated,’ I felt like I’d just shrink on set and end up not being able to do what I needed to do," as she shared what was going through her mind at the time.
She also revealed that she had auditioned more than 100 times since the age of 17, and that after so many rejections, she eventually found herself thinking in a self-deprecating way, "Maybe I’m just someone who gets rejected."
Kim Hye-yoon continued, "Because I failed so many auditions, I would go thinking, ‘I’m going to get rejected again today.’ Every time I auditioned, there was always a lot of talk about how I was too short. That was a real complex for me back then—being so short. I really wanted roles that didn’t suit me, so I would often embellish things about myself. I’m 158 cm, but I’d write 160 cm. Everyone actually knows. It always got found out, but I still went around adding about 2 cm. I got scolded in all sorts of ways. There were things said that could never be aired on TV, and I heard a lot of swearing on set. Whenever something upsetting happened there, I would cry in the car on the way home every day. I cried a lot even when I was on public transportation."
Without the support of an agency, Kim Hye-yoon spent seven years broadening her career on her own, reportedly commuting to filming locations by public transportation or on buses reserved for extras. She said, "I would go to a 24-hour café and wait there until the bus came, then head to the set, and even after waiting nine hours, sometimes my turn would never come. It was just endless waiting. When it was cold, they would offer heaters and hot packs, but up to that point I thought I wasn’t worth that kind of consideration, so I said I was fine. In high school, I got frostbite on my fingers. I think this is the first time I’m talking about it, but from that day my hands started swelling up and then my nails fell off. When I went to the hospital, they said that’s how cold it must have been, but I had just brushed it off at the time," drawing sympathy from viewers.

hsg@fnnews.com Han Seung-gon Reporter