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Watching Musicals with Internet Circle Members

Posted September. 13, 2004 22:12,   

한국어

Twenty Percent Discount for Group Viewers-

Viewing musicals with internet musical circle members, called “dan-gwan,” is popular. I watched a creative musical called “Anak Story” (Anak Jiaesa in Korean) together with members of “Oh My Musical (Oh-ma-myu),” a Cyworld musical circle, in order to find out where the popularity of “dan-gwan” lies.

At 6 p.m. in the afternoon on September 11, with a heavy rain pouring, club members gathered in a café in front of the Seoul COEX auditorium where “Anak Story” is showing. They lined themselves up in a row as club leader Kim Do-hyung (31, psychiatrist) came back bringing a bundle of reservation tickets to distribute.

The tickets the members received had “20 percent discount offered by production company” written on them. A major benefit of group viewing is this type of discount on tickets.

“Uh, seats are already all sold out up to the eighth row.”

“My seat is a bit far back, but since it’s in the middle, my view will still be good.”

The seats they reserved were from the third row to the 10th row of Section R. Kim, who is familiar with the layout of the theater, distributed the best seats to members in the order they arrived.

“Seeing this many people brought ‘love tickets,’ it seems true that our economy is in recession,” said Kim. A total of 60 people out of 78 presented “love tickets” that allow an additional discount of 5,000 won.

The advertisement of “dan-gwan” for “Anak Story” started on August 10, a month before the showing of the performance. Lee Jong-soon, a 27-year-old teacher and a member of “Oh My Musical,” said, “I loved ‘The Sorrow of Young Werthers (Die Leiden des jungen Werthers)’ that the same musical group performed. I am excited to get to see another musical by this group.”

Humming Songs Prior the Performance Heightens the Mood of Anticipation-

Kim Sei-hee, 24, sitting at a table, looked a bit bored. She started humming a song from the musical “Singin’ in the Rain,” and this initiated a conversation with another member sitting next to her about the lines in the musical. A member mentioned, “We enjoy performances better because we share the excitement together and the atmosphere gets livened up while we are waiting.”

At 7 p.m., the musical “Anak Story” started. It is a musical about the national pride of Goguryeo who was having conflicts with China. The laughter and applause that came from the rows where group viewers were seated was bigger than the applause from other rows.

At 10 p.m., the performance ended and circle members took pictures in small groups before heading to a nearby beer restaurant. A total of 20 members attended this after-play meeting. Naturally, reviews of the performance were exchanged among them. Since the club members are serious fans, they know all the names of the producers, musicians, and dressers of the musical, as well as the stage actors.

Evaluating the Performance While Drinking Beer-

“The music was good, but the directing seemed inexperienced and showed that this is their first big stage performance stage.”

“This was their debut. When it is a first performance, we should pay more attention to their potential.”

The theme of the conversation moved to the first meeting of their “Singing Group” tomorrow. The club leader, Kim, explained, “We felt we were watching performances in too passive a manner, so we decided to have this meeting to participate more through teaching ourselves to sing the songs in musicals.” They then headed to another café, their hangout in Shinchon, where they could “sing songs from the musical freely.”



Sue-Jean Kang sjkang@donga.com