The characters in the upcoming remake of "Full House" will be speaking Chinese. That's because the remake, which begins filming in December, is being co-produced by Korea's Group Eight Production Company and China's Asia Holdings.
But the star of this version will also be Korean. Eli of U-Kiss will play the leading male character made popular by singer-actor Rain in the 2004 k-drama version.
When foreign actors appear in Chinese dramas they are usually dubbed but that won't have to happen with Eli. He was born to Korean parents in Los Angeles, but after dropping out of high school, he traveled alone to Beijing at the age of 15. The main rapper in the six-member group U-Kiss, Eli went to school in China and also learned to speak Mandarin.
Besides brushing up on his language skills, he learned Taekwondo and King Fu techniques for 12 years, which led to him being cast as an extra in a Chinese film.
The k-drama, which also starred Song Hye Kyo, was wildly popular with ratings as high as 40 percent. Auditions will be held for the actress who will play the female lead.
In the original k-drama, Song Hye Kyo played Ji Eun, a screenwriter who lives in a house that her father built. It is called Full House. Her so-called friends trick her. They send her away on a fake free vacation and while she is away, they sell her house to a famous actor named Young Jae, played by Rain.
She comes back and she's homeless but she's not willing to give up on her house. Young Jae lets her live there but she has to live there according to his rules. That's not easy as she is a slob and he is very neat. Then they have a fake marriage to make his ex-girlfriend jealous and the eventually the two contractually married roommates fall in love.
There's no word on how faithfully the Chinese version will match the Korean one.
Group 8 is also the production company responsible for adapting the Japanese manga-based drama "Nodame Cantabile" into "Tomorrow Cantabile," starring Joo Won. They specialize in adapting manga-based dramas, as they were also instrumental in bringing "Pretty Man," which starred Jang Geun Suk, and "Playful Kiss," which starred Kim Hyun Joong, to Korea. The production company's most famous manga turned k-drama may be "Boys Over Flowers," starring Lee Min Ho and Gu Hye Sun.
