Profile | Who is Lee Je-hoon, versatile star of K-dramas Taxi Driver and Chief Detective 1958?
Whether playing a police officer, con artist or vigilante, Lee Je-hoon charms viewers with his mischievous smile and co*cksure gait, no matter how grim the subject of the stories he tackles.
Anyone who has seen an episode of Taxi Driver, one of his signature roles, can attest to this.
While many popular young stars today have made their names as music idols or by working their way up the standard acting ladder, Lee is one of the few actors who made his name by challenging himself with whatever was on offer.
He started out studying biotechnology at university but, when he developed a passion for acting, he switched to the school of drama at the Korea National University of Arts. He appeared in many student and indie works at this time, several of which helped to put him on the map.
Today he is one of the most popular actors around. Recently he took on one of Korea’s most beloved screen characters, portraying the much-loved Chief Inspector – a mainstay of the 1970s and 1980s in a television show of the same name – in a prequel procedural series, Chief Detective 1958.
Why we love him
What was attractive about Lee in his early acting days was his fearless approach to acting – in just a few short years, he had 18 roles in features and shorts.
His signature roles in this period include playing one of the lovers in the queer romantic short Just Friends? alongside fellow future star Yeon Woo-jin, which became a minor sensation after premiering at the Busan International Film Festival in 2009.
Lee cemented his status when he returned to Busan the following year as one of the stars of Bleak Night, a feature project from the Korean Academy of Film Arts which won the New Currents award – Busan’s top competitive prize – and earned rave reviews.
These days, Lee is most well known for playing characters who tackle social iniquities – roles that he says he gravitates towards.
As he explained in an interview with The Korea Times earlier this year, “As an actor, I take an interest in observing humans, much like one observes their surrounding environment.
“Naturally, I began to focus on incidents and events in society, nurturing hope for narratives where justice triumphs over evil, a desire shared by many.”
Lee has also found time to get behind the camera, having directed the “Blue Happiness” short in the omnibus film Unframed, which also premiered in Busan.
The star-making roles
In Bleak Night, Lee captivated viewers by playing a teenager whose death leads to a lot of soul-searching for those he leaves behind. In flashbacks, we see how this charismatic youth manipulated and bullied his classmates.
The role earned Lee no less than five best new actor accolades, including at the Blue Dragon and Grand Bell Film Awards.
Eighteen months later, Lee starred in modern melodrama classic Architecture 101, playing a naive architecture student who falls in love with his classmate, played by Bae Suzy. The film was a box office hit and propelled Lee to greater heights.
The much-loved parts
Lee embarked on his obligatory South Korean military service a few months after the release of Architecture 101. Upon his return, he became a fully fledged K-drama star, first appearing alongside Han Suk-kyu in the period drama Secret Door.
In 2016, he co-starred with Kim Hye-soo in what would become one of the most acclaimed K-dramas of all time, the fantasy serial killer procedural Signal. He plays a criminal profiler who comes into possession of a walkie-talkie which can connect him to a detective in the past.
Lee took on two roles that greatly raised his international profile during the early stages of the coronavirus pandemic. The first was in the futuristic youth-oriented heist thriller Time to Hunt for Netflix, which was originally meant for theatrical release.
In 2021, Lee scored a major hit with the moving series Move to Heaven, in which he plays an ex-convict who begins working for a trauma cleaning company that disposes of the possessions of the recently departed.
Perhaps his best-loved role to date has been in the two seasons of Taxi Driver, in which he plays the titular character Kim Do-gi, who moonlights as a daring vigilante.
The unheralded performances
Before Signal and Chief Detective 1958, Lee played an enigmatic sleuth on the big screen in the stylish action thriller Phantom Detective, an anachronistic noir that blends elements of past and present.
Another impressive film role for Lee was in Anarchist from Colony, where he vividly portrayed the real-life figure Pak Yol, a revolutionary fighter during Korea’s Japanese colonial era (1910-1945).
Tomorrow’s turns
Lee will soon be seen in the action thriller Escape, playing a North Korean soldier trying to escape to South Korea while being pursued by a North Korean officer played by Koo Kyo-hwan.
Also destined for cinemas is Moral Hazard, a financial thriller in which he will appear alongside Yoo Hae-jin.
He will be back on the small screen in The Art of Negotiation, a K-drama from The Midnight Romance in Hagwon director Ahn Pan-seok in which he will co-star with Kim Dae-myung and Yuri of K-pop group Girls’ Generation.
