Cross-dressing themes have always been popular with scriptwriters in Asian movies and TV dramas. More precisely, themes where a woman dresses as a man and everyone thinks that she is a man even if "he" looks nothing like a man (that is besides the shirt and pants look and sporting a short sassy crop)... Somehow the other way around is not all that popular... I think that maybe it is because Asians traditionally prefer their heroes to be handsome, macho and the take-charge type, and a cross-dressing feminine guy does not really fit into this idealized image of a hero.
It could also be a side effect of the Mulan syndrome... As anyone who is familiar with Chinese culture or who has watched the Disney cartoon Mulan
will know, Mulan is a fillal daughter who dresses as a man and goes to war in place of her aging father. Her courage and fillial piety has made her a much admired heroine in Chinese legends. Many authors were very likely inspired by her life story and the cross-dressing female has since become a popular plot device in a large number of stories set in East Asia. Examples include Zhu YingTai in The Butterfly Lovers, Ruixi (or Ashiya Mizuki) in Hana Kimi and the countless heroines in Chinese swordsfighting novels who dress like men so that they could travel across the the treacherous "Jiang Hu" or ancient puglistic world with as little trouble as possible (think Ziyi Zhang's character in Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon.
will know, Mulan is a fillal daughter who dresses as a man and goes to war in place of her aging father. Her courage and fillial piety has made her a much admired heroine in Chinese legends. Many authors were very likely inspired by her life story and the cross-dressing female has since become a popular plot device in a large number of stories set in East Asia. Examples include Zhu YingTai in The Butterfly Lovers, Ruixi (or Ashiya Mizuki) in Hana Kimi and the countless heroines in Chinese swordsfighting novels who dress like men so that they could travel across the the treacherous "Jiang Hu" or ancient puglistic world with as little trouble as possible (think Ziyi Zhang's character in Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon. More recently even Korean dramas have jumped on the bandwagon, Yoon Eun Hye who starred as the lively Princess Chae Gyung in Princess Hours
aka Goong cuts her hair short and ditches her gorgeous dresses in Princess for pants and shirts to play the "manly" part-time Taekwondo instructor and coffee shop assistant Go Eun Chan (picture) in First Shop Of Coffee Prince or Coffee Shop Prince. As with such stories, the hero of the tale Choi Han Kyul (played by Gong Yoo) does not recognise "him" as a her at the beginning. Despite being a lady-killer, he inadvertantly falls in love with Yoon's character and begins to doubt his sexual preferences. And you can be sure that the producers will milk this situation dry for laughs :-P
aka Goong cuts her hair short and ditches her gorgeous dresses in Princess for pants and shirts to play the "manly" part-time Taekwondo instructor and coffee shop assistant Go Eun Chan (picture) in First Shop Of Coffee Prince or Coffee Shop Prince. As with such stories, the hero of the tale Choi Han Kyul (played by Gong Yoo) does not recognise "him" as a her at the beginning. Despite being a lady-killer, he inadvertantly falls in love with Yoon's character and begins to doubt his sexual preferences. And you can be sure that the producers will milk this situation dry for laughs :-PActually I don't think Yoon Eun Hye looks like a man at all! Although she dresses like a guy and tries her darndest to behave like a guy, I simply cannot believe that anybody would mistake her for a guy because she is just so petite and has such delicate features... the most you could say is that she is a slightly macho looking tomboy but I definitely cannot think of her as a guy... Perhaps the producers could get someone who looks like Xena The Warrior Princess
to play such roles in the future, at the very least she has the right size and she definitely looks like she can beat plenty of guys to a pulp :-P
to play such roles in the future, at the very least she has the right size and she definitely looks like she can beat plenty of guys to a pulp :-P Regardless, such themes do strike a chord with audiences and are usually very popular. Coffee Prince hit ratings of above 20%* within 2 weeks of its debut and looks set to rise even higher, a very good result by Korean drama standards.
3 comments:
You can watch both Goong (aka Princess Hours) and Coffee Prince with English subtitles at:
http://www.mysoju.com
Thanks for the info!
I agree...
I actually found out about coffee prince when I read you blog post & nonw I'm hooked..so thanks!
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