Kim Hyun Joo | 김현주 | About

Kim Hyun Joo is a South Korean actress. She began modelling for teen magazines in her third year of high school, made her entertainment debut in 1996 in the music video for Kim Hyun Chul's "One's Lifetime", and started acting the following year in "The Reason I Live". Leading film roles came early, in "If It Snows on Christmas" (1998) and "Calla" (1999), followed by a run of supporting television parts.

"Glass Slippers" (2002) made her a star — a Cinderella story about two sisters separated as children, which rated above 30% and won her acting and popularity awards at the SBS Drama Awards. It travelled across China, Taiwan, Hong Kong and Vietnam, and that pan-Asian following took her opposite the Taiwanese actor Vanness Wu in the martial arts film "Star Runner" (2003). She then played Choi Seo Hee in "Toji, the Land" (2004-2005), the adaptation of Park Kyung Ni's novel, and was nominated Best TV Actress at the 2006 Baeksang Arts Awards.

After "Marrying a Millionaire" (2005) she took two years off, tired of being cast in sweet, wholesome parts — a decision she later regretted, saying she should have worked harder at developing as an actress instead. She returned in 2007 with "In-soon Is Pretty", as a woman rebuilding her life after prison, which drew a Top Excellence Award at the KBS Drama Awards despite modest ratings. In 2009 she took a small supporting role in "Boys Over Flowers" as Goo Jun Pyo's tough, stylish older sister, and starred in the legal drama "Partner".

2010 brought three losses close together: her friend the actor Park Yong Ha and the production executive who had cast her in "Toji" both died by suicide in the space of two days at the end of June, and her father Kim Tae Beom died a week later after a long illness. She spent the rest of the year volunteering in Bangladesh and the Philippines as goodwill ambassador for the NGO Good Neighbors, giving the condolence money from her father's funeral and part of the proceeds of her book to build libraries in eleven orphanages around Dhaka. "I literally fled to Bangladesh after a series of personal tragedies," she said, "but I was consoled by the smiles of children who are living in these dire conditions. The act of sharing has given me strength to live." She still teaches classes for Good Neighbors on global poverty to Korean schoolchildren.

Her work since has been steady and varied: "Twinkle Twinkle" (2011) and "What Happens to My Family?" (2014), both of which won her Top Excellence Awards; the scheming Lady Jo in "Blooded Palace: The War of Flowers" (2013), a deliberate break from her innocent image; dual roles in "I Have a Lover" (2015); the criminal lawyer of "Watcher" (2019); "Undercover" (2020); and Min Hye Jin, the attorney standing against religious extremists, in Netflix's "Hellbound" (2021). She led Yeon Sang Ho's science fiction film "Jung_E" (2023), and starred in "The Bequeathed" and "Trolley".

She published "Hyun-joo's Handcrafted Story", essays and photographs about her needlework and knitting, in December 2009, and made the documentary "ECO Canada by Kim Hyun-joo" for MBC Life.