Ok Ja-yeon (; born December 19, 1988) is a South Korean actress.

Early life

Ok was born and raised in

Suncheon Suncheon (; ) is the largest city in South Jeolla Province, South Korea, with a population of 280,719 as of 2022. It is located in the southeast of the province and is a scenic agricultural and industrial city, known for tourist attractions, suc ...

by school teacher parents. Ok described herself as not studious in her younger years, but due to the influence of her friend in middle school, she started taking her studies seriously. She then excelled in academics all throughout middle school and high school. She was also a member of the theater club in middle school, but had no desire of becoming an actress during that time. Ok initially wanted to become a lawyer and planned to study law for her undergraduate degree, but her grades did not meet the admission requirement of

Seoul National University Seoul National University (SNU; ) is a public university, public research university in Seoul, South Korea. It is one of the SKY (universities), SKY universities and a part of the Flagship Korean National Universities. The university's main c ...

for the said degree. Due to her interest in the arts, she then decided to major in aesthetics and planned to pursue law later. In her third year of university, Ok watched the play ''Snow In March'' and was moved by the performance of actor

Jang Minho Jang Ho-geun (, born 11 September 1977), known professionally as Jang Minho (), is a South Korean singer. He competed in the TV Chosun audition show ''Mr. Trot'', placing in the top sixth. He is also a model, dancer, and TV presenter. Early l ...

. She cited it as the reason why her love for theater and acting grew and her dream of becoming an actress was born.

Career

Ok decided to change careers and pursued acting at 25 years old (in

Korean age Traditional East Asian age reckoning covers a group of related methods for reckoning human ages practiced in the East Asian cultural sphere, where age is the number of calendar years in which a person has been alive; it starts at 1 at birth and i ...

). She made her acting debut in the theater play ''Guest'' in 2012. For almost 10 years, Ok only played minor and supporting roles in various stage plays, films, and TV dramas. In 2021, she landed her first main role in the TV series ''

Mine Mine, mines, miners or mining may refer to: Extraction or digging *Miner, a person engaged in mining or digging *Mining, extraction of mineral resources from the ground through a mine Grammar *Mine, a first-person English possessive pronoun M ...

'' which became a hit and Ok gained recognition for her villain character. For her performance, she received a Best Supporting Actress nomination at the

58th Baeksang Arts Awards The 58th Baeksang Arts Awards () ceremony, organised by JoongAng Group, was held on May 6, 2022, at KINTEX, Ilsanseo-gu, Gyeonggi Province, beginning at 7:45 p.m. KST. The event was hosted by Shin Dong-yup, Bae Suzy and Park Bo-gum and was ...

. Ok received her first acting award at the 23rd

Jeonju International Film Festival Jeonju International Film Festival (JIFF, ) is an Asian film festival based in South Korea. It was launched in 2000 as a non-competitive film festival seeking to introduce independent and experimental films to the general public and focusing ...

after being named Best Actress for her work in the independent film ''The Archeology of Love''. In April 2023, Ok was named as a judge at the 24th

for the International Competition category.

Filmography

Film

Television series

Web series

Television shows

Theater

Awards and nominations

References

External links

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Ok Ja-yeon
at PlayDB.co.kr {{DEFAULTSORT:Ok, Ja-yeon 1988 births Living people Actors from Suncheon Actresses from South Jeolla Province South Korean film actresses South Korean television actresses South Korean web series actresses South Korean stage actresses 21st-century South Korean actresses