Actor Eom Ki-joon posted a photo with Suzy of Miss A, who had come to watch the musical “Werther” on Twitter Sunday. The 39-year-old actor and the K-pop girl group member starred together on the KBS drama “Dream High” in 2011 as a teacher and student. Eom said he would perform on stage four more times before “Werther” end its run on Jan. 12. (khnews@heraldcorp.com)

Jan. 6, 2014

Actress Kim Yoon-jin graced a special section in the Friday edition of the New York Times, with a detailed interview covering her acting career and life story, including her childhood as an immigrant and her New Year resolutions. The NYT introduced Kim as a “game-changing” actress and previewed her comeback to the small screen on ABC TV show “Mistresses.” 　　Kim’s acting career began in the film “Shiri” in 1999, breaking box-office records in Korea. The star is now looking to take off to the U.S.

TelevisionJan. 6, 2014

Photographer Atta Kim, whose innovative, striking photographs have received much attention in the global art community, will return with a solo exhibition this week in Seoul, breaking his six-year hiatus in the Korean art world. Kim will present new images to wrap up the “On-Air” project that won him worldwide attention, as well as his previous works and introduce another ambitious, philosophical project at his upcoming exhibitions scheduled to be held in three parts for two years in his native

PerformanceJan. 5, 2014

“The Dinner,” the closing film of last year’s Busan International Film Festival, is finally hitting theaters this month, according to its distributor IndieStory.Directed by Kim Dong-hyun, the film is a drama about an ordinary Korean family facing a series of financial and other misfortunes. It was screened as a world premiere during BIFF last year.The film features an old married couple, who are financially dependent on their children. Yet all of their children have their own problems, often fin

FilmJan. 5, 2014

NEW YORK (AP) ― Spider-Man is swinging into history.Producers of “Spider-Man: Turn Off the Dark” said Thursday that the Smithsonian Institution is inducting one of the hero’s first costumes into the permanent collection at the National Museum of American History in Washington.The red-and-blue costume designed by Eiko Ishioka and worn by actor Reeve Carney will join a collection of iconic Americana that boasts the ruby slippers from “The Wizard of Oz,” a Kermit the Frog puppet, the first car driv

CultureJan. 5, 2014

Scottish rock band Travis is making its return to Korea, putting on its first solo concert in Seoul in five years with a live performance at the Olympic Hall in March. Led by Fran Healy on vocals, Travis formed in the early 1990s in Glasgow, and made a name for itself as one of the most well-respected rock bands from the U.K. Although Travis has always seemed to skirt away from the main spotlight, the rockers are still often credited for having influenced iconic British bands such as Coldplay an

PerformanceJan. 5, 2014

LOS ANGELES (AP) ― There is no more beautiful sound than the voices of siblings swirled together in high harmony, and when Phil and Don Everly combined their voices with songs about yearning, angst and loss, it changed the world.Phil Everly, the youngest of the Everly Brothers who took the high notes, died Friday from chronic obstructive pulmonary disease. He was 74. He left a towering legacy that still inspires half a century after The Everly Brothers’ first hit. You could argue that while Elvi

CultureJan. 5, 2014

NANTES, France (AFP) ― A Nazi-hunting family has called for protests against controversial French comedian Dieudonne over his vitriolic brand of humor targeting Jews, as a government minister said he must pay fines accrued for racist abuse. France’s Interior Minister Manuel Valls is training his sights on Dieudonne, whose trademark gesture is viewed as being Nazi-inspired, and is examining options to try to legally block performances by a man he brands a “little trader of hate.”On Friday, Valls

TelevisionJan. 5, 2014

QUITO (AP) ― An official in the Galapagos Islands says that Amazon founder Jeff Bezos was flown by helicopter from a cruise ship on Jan. 1 for medical attention after suffering intense pain because of a kidney stone. Capt. Santiago Rubio, commander of the port of Santa Cruz, tells the Associated Press that Bezos was near the island on the cruise when he felt the stomach pains. Rubio said Saturday the navy sent doctors to examine Bezos on New Year’s Day. The doctors determined that it was a kidne

PeopleJan. 5, 2014

LOS ANGELES (AP) ― Saul Zaentz, a music producer whose second career as a filmmaker brought him best-picture Academy Awards for “One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest,” “Amadeus” and “The English Patient,” has died. He was 92.Zaentz died Friday at his San Francisco apartment after suffering from Alzheimer’s disease, Paul Zaentz, the producer’s nephew and longtime business partner told the Associated Press.Zaentz was never a prolific movie producer, but he took on classy productions, specializing in co

PeopleJan. 5, 2014

AUSTIN, Texas (AP) ― Canada-born U.S. Sen. Ted Cruz has yet to renounce his birth country’s citizenship as promised ― but a spokeswoman said Saturday the conservative tea party favorite plans to finish the process soon.Catherine Frazier, a spokeswoman for the junior senator from Texas, said lawyers are preparing the necessary paperwork.The 43-year-old Cruz “has been fully focused on fighting for Texans’ values and interests in the Senate for the last year,” Frazier said via email. “He looks forw

PeopleJan. 5, 2014

Idol singer and style icon G-Dragon posted a photo of his father on Twitter Sunday morning with the title “Father and I in Sapporo for Big Bang Japan Dome tour 2014.”The photo shows the idol star taking a picture of his father sitting on a sofa dressed in black from head to toe, wearing a pair of matching black sneakers with a trendy muffler and fedora. The photo went viral among Twitter fans in Korea and abroad, receiving comments that his extraordinary fashion sense seems to come from his fath

Jan. 5, 2014

Classical music“2014 New Year’s Concert”: The famed Vienna Strauss Festival Orchestra will hold a New Year’s concert at the Seoul Arts Center concert hall on Jan. 15 at 8 p.m. Willy Byuhhira will direct the orchestra, formed 36 years ago, in its performances of “Overture Der Zigeunerbaron”; the waltz “Kuenstlerleben”; “Vergnuegungszug,” Polka-schnell, op. 281; and an excerpt from “Ritter Pazman” by Johann Strauss II, among others. Soprano Hong Hae-ran, the first Asian female winner of the 2011 Q

CultureJan. 3, 2014

The office floor of Kim Chang-il, chairman of Arario Group, is strewn with artworks like a statement of his life as an art lover. Four stuffed deer studded with glass balls, an artwork of Japanese artist Kohei Nawa, greet visitors. Then the onlooker’s gaze is naturally drawn to a large photograph hanging in the reception room, and then to more photographs and paintings in other rooms, all of them seen through glass walls. Kim, 63, who boasts a number of occupations ― a businessman, an art collec

PerformanceJan. 3, 2014

 Blue is the Warmest Color (France)Opening Jan. 16Romance. Drama. Directed by Abdellatif Kechiche. Adele (Adele Exarchopoulos), an ordinary high school girl, falls for a woman with blue hair while walking on the street one day. The two run into each other again at a lesbian bar, and Adele learns that the blue haired girl’s name is Emma (Lea Seydoux) and that she is a college student majoring in fine art. Adele, who has never dated a woman before, eventually moves into Emma’s place, stating a rel

FilmJan. 3, 2014

 Bieber looks to shed his ‘Baby’ imageJustin Bieber“Journals”Island Def Jam/UniversalThe Canadian teen pop sensation has dropped his latest studio album, looking to put his “Baby” days behind him by upping the sexual innuendo in his new 15-track album “Journals.” The 19-year-old pop star is shying away from the cutesy pop songs of his first album and energetic electro beats of his previous album “Believe” and is showing a bit of maturity in his move to more R&B-inspired tunes. His new album has

PerformanceJan. 3, 2014

“August: Osage County” travels from the stage to the screen with much of its theatricality intact. Too much. For all the scenic prairie panoramas and lived-in look of the big, rural Oklahoma house that is the setting, it still feels like a play ― with Meryl Streep, Julia Roberts and pretty much everybody else projecting to the back row.It’s a sharp-tongued melodrama of cruelty, comical cursing, “big scenes” and shocking revelations. Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright Tracy Letts kept it all in th

FilmJan. 3, 2014