K-drama stars Seo Kangjun, Ahn Eun-jin on A Love Other Than Yours, relationships

What happens when the person you have loved for ten years starts feeling less like a romantic partner and more like a part of your everyday life? For Seo Kangjun and Ahn Eun-jin, that was at the heart of their roles as Namgoong Ho and Lee Mi-do in the Korean drama A Love Other Than Yours. The romance follows the couple in their tenth year together, as the passion that once defined their relationship gives way to familiarity, loyalty, and trust. As unexpected emotions surface, they are forced to confront what their relationship has become and whether love can survive when the butterflies are gone.Both Kangjun and Eun-jin say that portraying a decade-long relationship in A Love Other Than Yours was less about recreating grand romantic moments and more about capturing the small, instinctive ways two people understand each other. From finishing each other’s thoughts to understanding seemingly incomprehensible conversations, the history between Namgoong Ho and Mi-do had to exist even when the audience wasn’t explicitly shown it. SEO KANGJUN AND AHN EUN-JUN ON LONG-TERM RELATIONSHIPS“Within our relationship in the series, we have a lot of scenes where we kiss, hold hands, hug, and express affection,” Kangjun tells India Today, adding, “But I didn’t think those moments should always feel exciting or full of butterflies. I wanted them to feel like part of the everyday life of two people who have been together for a long time.” That was important for Kangjun because Namgoong Ho and Mi-do are not a couple at the beginning of their relationship. They have already built a life around each other. Ho is a structured, dependable office worker who finds happiness in looking after Mi-do, while she is a struggling filmmaker who refuses to give up on her ambitions despite repeated setbacks. Their contrasting personalities have, until now, helped them complement each other.“Rather than constantly thinking, ‘I’m grateful because this person is my girlfriend or boyfriend,’ it becomes completely natural that this person is simply beside you, like someone who has been beside you since I was a child,” Kangjun says, continuing, “It feels completely normal to have that person next to me. That’s what I thought about.” Eun-jin found the same sense of familiarity crucial to understanding Mi-do and Ho’s relationship. The challenge, she says, was showing what happens when something that has always felt stable suddenly becomes unfamiliar.“That’s right. Since it felt completely natural, the problem arose in our relationship when excitement entered a place where there had been none,” she claims, sharing, “We tried hard to express the comfort that comes from knowing each other so well, where we could understand each other just by looking into each other’s eyes. I also tried to convey that convincingly.”ON THEIR IDEA OF LOVEThe drama, which premiered on September 12, explores what happens when that comfort begins to feel like stagnation. Ho and Mi-do find themselves questioning the future of their relationship, while other people enter their lives and force them to confront feelings they had perhaps taken for granted.So, what does it take to keep a long-term relationship alive? For Eun-jin, the answer is deceptively simple. “It may sound familiar, but wouldn’t it be important to keep a sense of gratitude alive?” she exclaims.Kangjun agrees, but adds that familiarity itself can become dangerous when it starts creating a sense of permanence. “Also, you shouldn’t take it for granted that this person is beside you,” he stresses. The actor asserts, “But when you’ve been in a relationship for a long time, their presence starts to feel natural. The illusion that they’ll always be there no matter what you do can ultimately damage the relationship.”That emotional complexity also informed Eun-jin’s portrayal of Mi-do. Unlike the more straightforward romantic heroine often seen in K-dramas, Mi-do is frustrated with where her life has ended up. The actor says that imperfection was precisely what made Mi-do relatable. “I’ve experienced that kind of flawed side in myself before, so I thought I could portray those emotions well,” she replies. Seo Kangjun and Ahn Eun-jin in a still from A Love Other Than Yours. Credit: KBS/Prime Video SEO KANJUN ON GETTING INSPIRED BY AL PACINOFor Kangjun, meanwhile, the challenge was almost the opposite. Namgoong Ho often keeps his feelings to himself. Rather than allowing the character’s internal turmoil to become overtly dramatic, Kangjun chose restraint. “I casually think that if you truly hold onto the emotions inside, they’ll eventually show,” he mentions.The actor then recalls advice from Al Pacino, whom he admires. “Al Pacino said in an interview, ‘Trying to express something that I’m not actually expressing isn’t good acting.’” That philosophy shaped his performance.“It’s important to hold onto what you’re genuinely feeling inside, trust that the camera will capture it, and believe in that,” Kangjun responds, adding, “So I tried to approach many scenes that way. I tried not to express everything too explicitly.”“I don’t know how much of it came through, but I trusted that those emotions would show through my eyes, my face and my expressions,” he adds. Seo Kangjun and Ahn Eun-jin in a still from A Love Other Than Yours. Credit: KBS/Prime Video The script, he says, gave him an understanding of what Namgoong Ho was feeling beneath the surface. But ultimately, his performance depended on trusting that the audience would notice what the character wasn’t saying. “I think trust is the most important thing,” Kangjun admits, elaborating, “I trust that even when I don’t explicitly express something, what’s inside me will still come through.”Eun-jin saw that approach most clearly in the ending of Episode 6, which aired on October 4, in a scene where Namgoong Ho does almost nothing. He simply listens. “Personally, even though his acting was good when we were filming scenes together, there was one scene with Kangjun that really impressed me. It’s the ending scene of Episode 6,” she recalls.“The scene is where Namgoong Ho simply listens. As he listens, you can feel his thoughts and emotions changing. He doesn’t really do anything. He just listens. But you can feel the change happening inside him at that moment," Eun-jin explains.For Eun-jin, the power of the scene lies in how little Kangjun does on the surface. “It’s not like he suddenly makes an obvious facial expression, yet you can clearly sense what he’s thinking and how his feelings are changing. As Kangjun said, having that mindset while acting is shown very well and comes across very well. I was really impressed by that scene," the actor gushes. Seo Kangjun in a still from A Love Other Than Yours. Credit: KBS/Prime Video And perhaps that is what A Love Other Than Yours is ultimately asking of its audience: not whether long-term love can remain exciting forever, but whether two people can recognise its value when excitement inevitably changes shape. The drama takes the familiar K-drama question of whether two people will end up together and turns it around, asking what happens when the two people are already together, have spent a decade building a life, and suddenly have to decide whether the love that brought them there is still enough.A Love Other Than Yours is available in India on Prime Video.- Ends