Yoo Ahin, born Uhm Hong-sik in 1986, was scouted in the streets while still in high school, where he was majoring in fine arts. His career started in 2003, appearing in TV commercials under his current stage name of Yoo Ahin. Later that year, he made his acting debut in the TV series <Sharp 1>, followed by an appearance in <April Kiss>. After a short hiatus he took so he would have time to decide whether to continue on this career path, he came back more determine...More

Yoo Ahin, born Uhm Hong-sik in 1986, was scouted in the streets while still in high school, where he was majoring in fine arts. His career started in 2003, appearing in TV commercials under his current stage name of Yoo Ahin. Later that year, he made his acting debut in the TV series <Sharp 1>, followed by an appearance in <April Kiss>. After a short hiatus he took so he would have time to decide whether to continue on this career path, he came back more determined than ever and immediately passed an audition for one of the lead roles in <Boys of Tomorrow> in 2006. The director saw in him the quintessence of youth, and Yoo went on to win Best New Actor from the Busan Film Critics Association. He then appeared in the period drama series <Strongest Chil Woo> (2008) and the romcom series <He Who Can’t Marry> (2009), while earning the favor of the critics with his performance in the drama film <Skeletons In The Closet> (2007). His first claim to fame came with his role in the historical drama series <Sungkyunkwan Scandal> (2010). In 2011, he won over audiences again for his role in <Punch>, thereby cementing his status as screen star, and in 2012, he was back with the drama series <Fashion King>. He returned to the big screen two years later in the drama <Tough as Iron> and alongside Jung Yumi, his co-star in that film, he later performed voice duties for the 2014 animation <The Satellite Girl and Milk Cow>. Following a quiet spell during the rest of the year, Yoo headlined a pair of major films in 2015, the hit action-thriller <Veteran> from Ryoo Seungwan, in which he reinvented himself as the merciless heir to a powerful conglomerate, and Lee Joonik’s <The Throne>, starring as the Crown Prince Sado who was famously made to suffocate to death by his father, King Yeongjo, in a large wooden chest filled with rice. The latter performance earned him the Blue Dragon Film Award and the Chunsa Film Award for Best Actor. Next for him was another turn as a Joseon royal, this time as King Taejong, in the historical drama series <Six Flying Dragons> (2015-2016). After starring in the fantasy series <Chicago Typewriter> in 2017, he returned to the big screening two years later playing against Steven Yeun in <Burning> (2018), Lee Changdong’s highly anticipated first film in close to a decade. The film premiered in Cannes and later made the headlines in Korea for being the first Korean film to make it into the final shortlist for the Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film, although it ultimately wasn’t nominated. Not that it prevented Yoo from gaining international recognition, with The New York Times including him in its end-of-year roundup of best actors and Forbes seeing in him an up-and-coming star to watch. In the financial drama <Default> (2018), also released in 2019, he played a young stockbroker who predicts Korea’s bankruptcy in 1997 and bets on it. While Yoo has been pretty busy in recent years with his other activities as a gallerist and a talk show producer, he made a brilliant comeback on the big screens in 2020 when he headlined <#ALIVE> (2019), which attracted close to 2 million people in early summer, therefore becoming the first hit in Korea since COVID-19 hit the film industry. His next performance as a mute fixer for a gang in <Voice of Silence> (2020), a critically acclaimed indie drama that won the top prize at the Fantasia International Film Festival, earned him Best Actor from the same event. In 2022, he headlined the action-packed Netflix original movie <Seoul Vibe>.Less