Actor Park Sung Hoon apologized once again for posting a Japanese AV cover on his SNS and explained the situation at the time.

On the afternoon of the 8th, Park Sung Hoon met with Donga.com for an interview about the Netflix series ‘Squid Game Season 2’ (hereafter ‘Squid Game 2’) at a cafe in Samcheong-dong, Jongno-gu, Seoul, and talked about the work.

Before the interview began, Park Sung Hoon opened up about posting and then deleting a Japanese AV (Adult Video) cover that parodied the ‘Squid Game’ series on his SNS story on December 30th of last year.

Park Sung Hoon said, “First of all, I would like to apologize for causing inconvenience and concern to many people due to my recent huge mistake. I approached it with a more heavy and nervous heart than ever. The biggest reason is that there was a lot of hard work from the production team, staff, actors, and many other people, so I think I‘m very nervous that I might cause more damage,“ he said, apologizing.

Park Sung-hoon also said about the situation that day, ”I had a schedule that day at lunchtime, so I was getting ready to go out, and I found the problematic photo in my DM. At that time, the drama had only been released for a few days. It was a time when I exchanged reactions from viewers with the person in charge. The photo was so shocking, and I thought it would be problematic, so I’m not sure if there was a mistake in saving the photo during the process of sending it, but after a while, it was posted on the story.“



He continued, ”I was so flustered that I called the person in charge and talked to him. And I deleted the photo right away. Of course, I didn‘t even look at it. I know that they’re saying that I made a mistake while trying to upload it using a sub account, but I don‘t use a sub account. He drew the line, saying, “I only have one account.”

Park Sung Hoon also added, “Anyway, it was my mistake that it was posted, but I think a mistake is a mistake. I caused concern to many people, and after realizing my mistake, I have felt a lot of self-reproach, regret, and reflection for several days. I am still doing so up until this moment. I fully feel the gravity of the situation, and I will become a person who speaks and acts with a heavy heart so that similar mistakes do not occur in the future, and who will continue his career as an actor.”

The reason Park Sung Hoon’s photo became even more controversial was because of the position of his agency, BH Entertainment. At the time, the agency explained, “Park Sung Hoon was receiving so many DMs (direct messages) on his social media that he accidentally uploaded it while checking his DMs,” but since it is structurally difficult to upload like that, suspicions grew even more.



Regarding this, Park Sung Hoon said, “I couldn’t get a proper answer from the company. It was a shocking situation where even I had a hard time figuring out how it went up there. I concluded that that‘s how it went up there. He said, ”I think that’s why we talked about whether I had no choice but to go up like this and expressed my position like that.“ When asked by a reporter, ”Was there a miscommunication?“ Park Sung-hoon replied, ”I think there was something like that.“

Also, regarding Director Hwang Dong-hyeok‘s previous interview where he said he hadn’t heard anything from Park Sung-hoon about the incident, he said, ”I remember calling you right after that happened. The call didn‘t connect. After that, the director had a schedule in the U.S. and I thought he had a lot to worry about. I felt so sorry that I didn’t have the courage to pick up the phone again. I thought it would be right to call you again after the big schedule had passed and the issue had been resolved. My feelings have been conveyed through the company,” he said. “I still feel so sorry that I haven’t had the courage to call them directly.”

Finally, Park Sung Hoon could not hold back his tears and said in a trembling voice, “I’m really upset that something like this happened when the drama and character were receiving so much attention and love. First of all, I feel very sorry towards our entire team.”

He also added, “Many people around me comforted me. They told me that not all reactions were bad and that there were many people supporting me, so I thought to myself that I was really lucky. I was grateful.”

Finally, when asked by a reporter if he would make the DM public, Park Sung Hoon said, “It’s not easy to find it because so much time has passed. The PR team will provide additional answers.”

Meanwhile, ‘Squid Game 2’, released on December 26, is a story about the fierce confrontation between Ki-hoon (played by Lee Jung-jae), who vows revenge and returns to participate in the game, and the frontman (played by Lee Byung-hun) who greets him, as well as the real game starting again.

Park Sung-hoon plays ‘Hyun-joo’, transgender number 120, who needs money to complete gender confirmation surgery in ‘Squid Game 2’.

Choi Yoon-na, Donga.com reporter yyynnn@donga.com