Actor Hwang Seok-jeong opened up about her decades-long estrangement from her mother on the August 29 broadcast of MBN’s Kim Joo-ha’s Day & Night. Speaking alongside actor Lee Hyun-shik, Hwang revealed that a turbulent household dynamic left them unable to speak for 40 years.
The Bottom Line
- The Revelation: Actor Hwang Seok-jeong revealed on MBN’s Kim Joo-ha’s Day & Night that she did not speak to her mother for 40 years due to childhood trauma and pressure over music education.
- Shared Screen: Hwang appeared on the program alongside actor Lee Hyun-shik to discuss their roles as scene-stealers in Na Hong-jin’s film Hope.
- Healing and Reconciliation: The estrangement finally began to thaw later in life after Hwang stepped in to cover her mother’s medical surgery expenses, leading them to live together and resolve past grievances.
Unpacking a Lifetime of Artistic Pressure and Family Estrangement
During the episode of Kim Joo-ha’s Day & Night, Hwang Seok-jeong shared a painful history rooted in unfulfilled artistic ambitions. According to the broadcast, Hwang’s mother harbored immense academic prowess and a deep desire to study music, frequently ranking first in her class despite severe financial hardship. In an effort to secure her education, her mother once fled the house to seek out a high school mentor and successfully earned a scholarship slated for study in the United States—only to be blocked by her family from going.
That profound frustration rippled through the household for decades. Hwang explained that her father possessed a natural, unstudied talent for music and served in a military band, but he frequently spent time drinking and gambling while contributing no income. The financial strain amplified her mother’s burning anger, a displaced rage that ultimately targeted young Hwang.
“From the time I was three years old, I would panic just seeing my mother,” Hwang confessed during the program. With a candidness that stunned the panel, she admitted she craved basic affection yet felt like her mother resembled a “witch” rather than a nurturer. Despite living in extreme poverty where paying monthly rent and securing proper meals were constant struggles, the household mandate remained immovable: Hwang had to practice the piano. The resulting emotional barrier meant mother and daughter went without speaking well into Hwang’s early 40s.
| Cast Member | Role in Hope | Previous Collaboration with Na Hong-jin |
|---|---|---|
| Hwang Seok-jeong | Health Center Chief | The Yellow Sea, The Wailing |
| Lee Hyun-shik | Haesul (Village Elder) | First collaboration |
From the Set of Na Hong-jin’s Hope to Personal Reconciliation
The emotional television appearance wasn’t entirely centered on past wounds; it arrived alongside a promotional push for the feature film Hope. Directed by Na Hong-jin, the movie follows residents fighting to protect their village from an unidentified entity. Host Kim Joo-ha highlighted that the director specifically wrote parts with both Hwang and Lee in mind, cementing their reputations as scene-stealers.
For Hwang, joining the production was an instinctive decision. Reflecting on her path in the film industry, she recounted her earlier auditions for Na’s The Yellow Sea, where she endured a month of minor role evaluations and practiced Yanbian dialects. She later appeared in Na’s The Wailing, where she faced the task of handling and slaughtering poultry despite a severe phobia of birds. When offered a role in Hope, she accepted immediately without even reading the script.
The dynamic shifted only after Hwang stepped up to finance her mother’s necessary medical surgery. By bringing her mother into her home to care for her post-operation, Hwang confronted the root of the trauma head-on. By deeply analyzing her mother’s character and lifelong frustrations, she finally began to understand the woman behind the strict exterior, allowing them to slowly untangle a lifetime of silence.
As actor Lee Hyun-shik similarly shared poignant memories of his own mother on the very same broadcast—recounting how she physically climbed university stairs to advocate for his admission into the theater department—the episode crystallized into a broader cultural conversation about generational sacrifice, parental ambition, and the heavy emotional toll placed on children caught in the crossfire of unrealized dreams.
