Representative Kwak Sin-ae: "Vice Chairman Lee Mi-kyung's Remarks Were Prearranged Among Us"

[Image source=Yonhap News]

[Asia Economy Reporter Lee Jong-gil] Kwak Shin-ae, CEO of Barunson E&A, which produced the film Parasite, stated on the 12th that the team had prearranged for Lee Mi-kyung, Vice Chairman of CJ Group, to give her acceptance speech immediately after hers at the Academy Awards. In a post on social media that day, CEO Kwak wrote, “In case we won Best Picture, our team had prearranged for Vice Chairman Lee Mi-kyung to give her speech right after me. Since it was a live broadcast and the last segment, and we didn’t know when the cut-off would happen, I deliberately prepared a very brief speech to finish quickly and pass the turn to her.”

This appears to explain the situation after some controversy arose over Vice Chairman Lee’s acceptance speech when Parasite won Best Picture at the Academy Awards. At that time, Vice Chairman Lee spoke in English, saying, “I love everything about Director Bong Joon-ho. His smile, hairstyle, the way he talks and walks, especially his directing style,” and then expressed gratitude to the Parasite production team, her brother Lee Jae-hyun, Chairman of CJ Group, and Korean audiences.

Vice Chairman Lee was credited as the Executive Producer of the film. She invested over 10 billion KRW over five months in the Oscar campaign to garner support from Academy members.

[Image source=Yonhap News]

Typically, the Best Picture award nominees include both producers and directors, and it is customary for either the producer or director to give the acceptance speech. Because of this, some viewed Vice Chairman Lee’s speech as unusual and criticized whether she should have appeared instead of the director. Regarding this, CEO Kwak explained, “Director Bong had already won three times and was in a state of ‘speech exhaustion,’ so he did not give a separate speech.” CEO Kwak returned to Korea that morning with the Parasite cast and staff. Director Bong will finish his schedule in the U.S. and return next week.

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.