International Disruptors: Saram Entertainment’s South Korean Super-Agent Soyoung Lee, Who Represents Stars From ‘Squid Game’, ‘Pachinko’ & ‘Minari’, Talks Korean Content Explosion, Working With The U.S. & Artists International JV

deadline.com:

Welcome to Deadline’s International Disruptors, a feature where we’ll shine a spotlight on key executives and companies outside of the U.S.

who are shaking up the offshore marketplace. This week, we’re speaking with Korean super-agent Soyoung Lee, who represents some of the nation’s biggest stars and talked to us about her experiences of the Korean content boom.Few have been better placed to both witness and be part of the Korean content explosion than Soyoung Lee, super-agent and founder of one of the nation’s largest talent agencies, Saram Entertainment.When she opened what was then called Jaewon Promotion Co almost exactly two decades ago – mainly specializing in marketing major brands such as McDonald’s – Soyoung could never have foreseen that by 2022 she would be representing some of the biggest and most in-demand stars not just in Korea but the world.  “We started completely by chance,” she tells Deadline, speaking on Zoom via a translator in late July. “I met actor Cho Jin-woong (Deep Rooted Tree) and he asked me how management companies could also provide marketing to develop his brand.

I said I’d help and that was really the start of my entertainment business.”Fast-forward two decades from her chance meeting with Cho and Soyoung’s talent roster is enough to leave rivals green with envy.Her team now represent the likes of Squid Game breakout Hoyeon, who wowed the world with her performance as North Korean defector and general badass Kang Sae-byok and is now starring in Apple TV+’s Disclaimer, Minha Kim, who plays teen Sunja in the same streamer’s critically-acclaimed Pachinko, and Yeri Han, Monica from Academy Award-nominated tearjerker Minari.And those three don’t tell half the story.