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The Star Online: Entertainment: TV & Radio

Posted: 09 Oct 2012 03:46 AM PDT

Korean reality show Running Man is a big hit in the Asian region. But what do the regular cast members do when they are not running?

YOU might have seen some excited individuals running around KLCC in the heart of Kuala Lumpur not too long ago. No, it was not a sale they were after. They probably just did not get the memo – South Korean reality show Running Man was not shooting in Malaysia.

For weeks, the Net was abuzz with news that the hit show would have a "secret" filming in Kuala Lumpur. Alas, it turned out to be a mistake by an employee at a TV station.

The online fever is only testament to the popularity of the reality show that has often been described as "extreme hide-and-seek meets The Amazing Race".

For those who have yet to become fans of the series, this heady "urban action variety show" pits its seven celebrity hosts against each other, or different stars from the Korean entertainment scene, in various challenging but always wacky race missions every week. To eliminate an opponent before the finish line, they have to tear off his or her nametag.

More telling is the excitement of Malaysian fans to meet the hosts – and not the possible K-megastar guests – when the rumour broke out.

But then again, it is not difficult to see why there is so much love for the Running Man regulars – music stars Gary Kang, Ha Dong-hoon and Kim Jong-kook, actors Lee Kwang-soo and Song Ji-hyo, broadcaster Ji Suk-jin and comedian Yoo Jae-suk.

With their individual quirks – notably Kwang-soo's blurness, Dong-hoon's cheekiness, Jong-kook's kiasu-ness, lone female cast member Ji-hyo's craftiness – the motley crew cooks up one thing when thrown together: fun.

Watching the naturalness of the co-hosts in their camaraderie – and their scheming, cheating, lying, betraying and sometimes, even biting moments - while gunning for the grand prize does make one wonder: How real is this reality show?

Has the "battle" ever continued off camera?

Of course, jests Dong-hoon, better known as HaHa.

"Whether or not the camera is rolling, we are always suspicious of each other and wondering, 'You're going to betray us, right?'"

Their close-knit relationship on screen is very real though, shares HaHa, and he and his co-stars meet regularly outside the show.

"Even if there isn't filming, we'll meet to exchange ideas, hang out, catch up with one another, and even exercise together."

In fact, says HaHa who has been with the show since it started in 2010, Running Man is almost like a second family to him. Best known for his role in the sitcom Nonstop, HaHa was recruited to be one of the regular racers after he completed his military service.

"The Running Man members are very close as we've been working together very often since we were younger. I've been working with Jae-suk for a really long time, and I've known Jong-kook for 14 years. I've also been close with Gary even before we were in the show. Everyone is close and gets along like a real family."

But if there is anyone among his fellow Runners that he will not mind making an enemy of, it is Jong-kook, jokes HaHa.

"I always complain to the producers, 'Give a handicap to Kim Jong-kook. Please control his strength'. I would love to win the final mission at least once.

"Honestly, even up against three fit and able-bodied men, he's the 'Hulk'! When he's entirely immersed in filming, he's really scary. He's really frightening."

Fans would know that the German-born 33-year-old recording artiste, actor and stand-up comedian is not short of tricks up his sleeve when it comes to winning the race.

He may often be picked on by his co-hosts because of his height (1.7m) and his close resemblance to Pororo, the Little Penguin cartoon character (which has earned him the nickname Haroro), but HaHa is the top trickster of the show.

Revelling in his mischief making, he rattles on proudly, "The image I have always had since I was younger is that of a troublemaker. Previously I always welcomed guests such as Haroro, and always tried to be the last love of the female guests. Whenever there is conflict, I'm also always a part of it. The same goes for betrayals."

However, he finds playing the "spy" on Running Man extremely nerve-wracking.

"If we're found out right at the beginning, the flow of the whole shoot can be disrupted. As such, the role of the 'spy' is actually very burdensome. As a spy, we have to be able to react according to the circumstances or the whole episode can be messed up."

Another nerve-wracking experience he says is having K-pop idols on the show.

"While having idols would be good, I'm really worried that they may get injured during filming."

Personally, he would like to invite action stars or international athletes to Running Man such as Olympic sprinter Usain Bolt or Hollywood action star Tom Cruise, and Asian actors Chow Yun-fat and Andy Lau.

"Just thinking about Tom Cruise jumping down from the building on a wire and tearing off our nametags makes me excited and my heart race."

Other dream guests? Jackie Chan and the Expendables, he raves.

"If the actors from The Expendables like Arnold Schwarzenegger, Sylvester Stallone and even Jason Statham came, it would be a big hit."

Of course, it is a different story when it comes to female idols for the Running Man resident ladies' man, who names Girls' Generation as a favourite.

"When Girls' Generation came as guests, I was really happy. Everyone was so happy that we were very sad when they left. We still felt the sorrow even a week later."

Other favourites are f(x) and Miss A's Suzy.

"The most memorable one for me, since I'm a Suzy fan, would be when we had a couple game and linked arms. It was interesting and I also came in first in that episode which made it even more memorable," he reminisces.

Still, he would have to rid himself of the playboy image soon with his impending marriage to singer Byul next month.

When asked if it is difficult to balance filming Running Man and planning a wedding, he admits that no wedding preparations have been done.

"We're still looking for a location. Really, nothing has been fixed at all."

While he is at a loss to pick a favourite episode or the most challenging opponent, HaHa nominates actor Choi Min-soo (The Legend and My Wife Is A Gangster 3) as the scariest.

"Our eternally tough guy, the icon of toughness, Choi Min-soo, was entirely immersed in filming and was overflowing with charisma, so it was a scary memory for me."

This does not stop him from dreaming of facing off with other "scary" tough guys like Mike Tyson and Ultimate Fighting Championship athletes Chu Sung-hoon, Kim Dong-yeon and Jung Chang-sun.

HaHa shares that he has no plans in the near future for another sitcom but he would like to do more music.

"I started off as a rapper and love rap but right now, Bob Marley is my main influence. Reggae has become one of the charms of my life, and given me the strength to stand on stage again."

He laments the lack of respect that reggae is getting from South Korea and the rest of Asia and hopes to change it with a tour around the region with his friend, Korean reggae star Skull, one day.

"Skull is a good friend of mine. His song reached third place on the Billboard charts. If there's a chance, I would love to hold reggae party performances around Asia with him, especially to the countries that love reggae."

He feels that this is something that would have not even been conceivable without the growing influence of Hallyu and the popularity of Running Man.

"With the growing influence of Hallyu, I've also been able to receive support from South-East Asian fans. I'm also really thankful to Running Man. It was my birthday on Aug 28, and many fans sent presents to my restaurant," he says, thanking fans for his birthday surprises.

Although the tight schedule of Running Man means he is not able to go on vacations, he hopes to keep on running on the show a while longer.

"I never expected so many people (especially those from South-East Asia) to love us and our programmme. I wish I could visit every country to meet all of you, but there are just too many," HaHa adds.

> Running Man airs every Friday at 6.25pm on ONE HD Astro B.yond (Ch 393).

She rocks!

Posted: 09 Oct 2012 03:48 AM PDT

Here is a shortlist of awesome female TV characters that are a source of inspiration and joy.

IN Nikita, Maggie Q kicks some serious a%#$ as the title character: an assassin who escapes from the Division (a secret government-funded organisation that recruited her and other young people with troubled backgrounds to work as spies/assassins) and goes rogue.

Nikita then uses the training she received to get back at the Division, foiling their operations with the ultimate aim of bringing them down. She is awesome – strong, ruthless, intense. Her action sequences are awesome too – Q does her own stunts. She is beautiful and fierce. After each episode, I kinda want to be like her. And it wouldn't hurt to look like her either. Hot dang, the girl's got it.

Nikita isn't an anomaly in TV-land. Strong women flourish on TV. Remember Buffy, the vampire slayer? Xena, the warrior princess? (Yes, I am serious). And Jaime Sommers, the bionic woman (played by Lindsay Wagner in the 1970s series)? Sure, Jaime came after The Six Million Dollar Man, but boy, was she a hero from my past.

Yeah, TV is a great place to be in if you're a woman, which is why more and more big screen stars – Kyra Sedgewick, Glenn Close, Madeline Stowe, to name a few – are turning to TV for meatier, more nuanced roles.

In The Good Wife, three of the show's main characters are women: Alicia Florrick (Julianna Margulies), Kalinda Sharma (Archie Punjabi) and Diane Lockhart (Christine Baranski). They're all deeply flawed and vulnerable in different ways, but they certainly drive the plot and they're definitely the most compelling characters in the legal drama.

Quite frankly, the men around them – Peter Florrick, Alicia's philandering husband, Will Gardner, Diane's partner in the law firm and Alicia's boss (and incidentally former boyfriend) and Cary Argos, a young, ambitious lawyer – pale in comparison. They're not bad by any means, they're just outshined by their co-stars.

Mariska Hargitay's character Olivia Benson in Law & Order: Special Victims Unit is another woman to behold. Both strong and vulnerable, Olivia fights to get sexual offenders off the streets while at the same time battling her own demons: she is the child of rape (her mother got pregnant after being raped), who was subsequently abused by her alcoholic mother. More often than not, her unresolved issues come to surface as she works on cases that hit close to home. But Benson uses her painful past to fuel her work. She will not be brought down ... and I mean this literally. The show is in its 14th season for heaven's sake!

Not all the leading women on TV are cops, assassins, vampire slayers or legal eagles. There's Liz Lemon (Tina Fey), the head writer for the fictitious comedy sketch show on 30 Rock. Liz makes being a geek look so good. She's confident, sassy, funny, strange, awkward and an independent single woman who isn't hung up about relationships. She isn't your typical role model and yet, women want to be her (or maybe we just want to be Tina Fey?).

Let's talk Mad Men. Despite it being set in a male-dominated world of advertising in the 1960s, I think the women outshine the men on the show. Sure, the dudes are powerful, but they're all philandering, whiny louses trapped by their own stereotypes. They wheel and deal, booze all day long and sleep around a lot. Big deal. It's only because they're unhappy with themselves. I'd much rather be Peggy Olsen (Elisabeth Moss), the seemingly innocent but incredibly ambitious woman who started off as ad-man Don Draper's secretary but worked her way to becoming the agency's first female writer. Or even Betty Draper (January Jones) who got sick of her husband's cheating and left him (after having an affair herself).

The list of women who've made it on TV is endless (The Game Of Thrones has a few fine examples, Glen Close's ruthless character Patty Hews on Damages is a force to reckon with, Anna Torv's seriously cool character Olivia Dunham on Fringe), but I have a word-count to keep so I will end with one of my current favourites: the vice president of the United States, Selina Meyer played by Julia Louis-Dreyfus in Veep. She's pretty awesome. — SI

Women on TV – there have been so many that I really enjoyed watching. From Morticia Addams (Carolyn Jones on The Addams Family) and Jaime Somers (Lindsay Wagner in Bionic Woman) whom I grew up in awe of to Murphy Brown (Candice Bergen in Murphy Brown) and modern day girls, America Ferrera and Becki Newton (Betty and Amanda on Ugly Betty), even super soldier Jessica Alba (Dark Angel) or double agent Jennifer Garner (Sydney Bristow in Alias).

The women are usually beautiful and tough cookies – take Kate Austen (Evangeline Lilly on Lost) and Claire Bennet (Hayden Panettiere on Heroes), so there's little chance you won't love them. And even when they are cartoon characters like Lisa Simpson, they're pretty smart and sassy.

If I had to choose some favourites – and this is highly subjective and will probably change every month depending on how the stars are aligned and what my mood is like – I'd have to go with Brenda Leigh Johnson (Kyra Sedgewick on The Closer).

A tough-as-nails detective, Brenda Leigh is able to close all her cases before they even reach a courtroom. She's very smart, she earned the respect of her team without bending backwards to appease them, she has a secret stash of chocolates and biscuits in her desk drawers, she fell in love with and got married to the handsomest FBI agent in town, she has a cat ... what's not to like about this character?

I secretly think I'm Brenda Leigh, but the closest I get to being her is maybe the emergency chocolate I keep in my drawer. And, yeah, I've been contemplating adopting a kitten.

No.2 on my list is world's away from my first choice. Joy Turner of My Name Is Earl is as white trash as one can get, and yet I find myself immensely enamoured by her.

Portrayed by Jaime Pressly, Joy has a motor mouth and gets some of the best lines on the show. The ex-wife of Earl and now married to Crabman and living in a camper van, Joy brings a ray of light to an already laugh-out-loud series, and she's as strong as a woman can be, to have put up with all the men on that show.

I'm trying to narrow down which women I like in space, and I can think of two that I really wanted to be at some point. Starbuck (Katee Sackhoff) from Battlestar Galactica, and Inara Serra from Firefly. I wanted to be Kara Thrace (that's Starbuck's real name) because well, she sure can fly a viper, and I wanted to be Inara because she had Malcolm Reynolds (Nathan Fillion) wrapped around her finger, didn't she? (My amorous feelings towards Nathan Fillion are not a national secret. I even follow him on Twitter, for crying out loud).

My favourite teenager on TV was Veronica Mars. I followed the series religiously and fell in love with Kristen Bell's character and all her boyfriends, too. I so wanted to be a private investigator like her in my younger days. Favourite lawyer? Well, it'd have to be Ally McBeal (Calista Flockhart) simply because of the awesome mini skirts.

There's a string of strong mums that I grew up watching whom I looked up to – Caroline Ingalls (Karen Grassle in Little House On The Prairie), Sarah Connor (Lena Headey in Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles) and even Lois Griffin in The Family Guy – they may have been kooky and unorthodox in their parenting skills, but they sure won my vote as unforgettable women on TV. — AMC

Kredit: www.thestar.com.my

Isnin, 8 Oktober 2012