Song Hye Kyo Responds to Comments That She Looks “Old” in the Opening Scene of “The Glory”

There’s a reason why K-drama viewers have been raving about Netflix’s The Glory. Since its premiere, the revenge series has sat comfortably in the platform’s top TV shows list, with fans eagerly anticipating its second season come March 2023.

At the helm of it all is one of the Korean entertainment scene’s most celebrated performers, Song Hye Kyo. The Hye Kyo we see here is a browbeaten, more somber version of the celebrated actress. She plays Moon Dong-eun, a bullying survivor who’s hellbent on exacting revenge on her perpetuators.

The show opens with a scene that’s enough to get anyone’s spine tingling. In nothing but black underwear, Dong-eun can be seen pinning pictures to a wall and crafting her masterplan. You might get thrown off upon seeing the red bruises across her body, which you can only assume are remnants of the torment she went through.

In an interview with Elle Korea, Hye Kyo said that she, along with director Kim Eun Sook, purposely wanted Dong-eun to look “like a skinny woman who needs to be protected.”

The actress explains, “I hardly ever [wore] makeup, and the lighting went in the direction of making it look like that. Dong-eun has suffered all her life, [and] if she comes out with a perfectly-managed appearance, I think it really makes no sense.”

Some viewers have come forward with their comments that she “suddently got old” for the role, pertaining to her looks, which she actually attests to. “Of course, I got older,” she says.

Another factor the 41-year-old considered was how Dong-eun’s figure could contribute to the plot. “I thought that it would be more pleasurable when the perpetrators were beaten by a small person who would think, ‘What’s so scary about a kid like that.’ I adjusted her diet more when filming scenes that revealed her scars,” states Hye Kyo.

Doing an entire sequence in just a black bra and boxers is quite new for the Hallyu star, and in their industry, it’s actually considered taboo. She was offered to have a body double conduct the scene for her, but she refused.

She says that: “I think I’d have been embarrassed if I had used a substitute. I also had a strange confidence. It’s possible because I lost weight, not because I [thought] my body [was] pretty, but because I [had] no doubt that [it was] a necessary scene.” We love the dedication!