Yoo In-Na Has Some Advice For Her ‘True To Love’ Dating Coach Character

Bo-ra works as a dating coach and has written What You Got Wrong About Your Love Life, a bestselling advice book. Her book contains her rules for having a successful romance, but Bo-ra is so busy dispensing advice in the k-drama True to Love that she ignores the problems with her own relationship. Her confidence is appealing, but perhaps unwarranted. Actress Yoo In-na, who plays Bo-ra/pen name Deborah, is not sure the character is qualified to offer such advice.

“Bo-ra realized what love is like from witnessing her parent’s frequent quarrels and thought that many rules are needed in order to be loved consistently,” said Yoo. “Based on that, she gave dating advice to people around her and there were many successful cases, so she had no doubt and believed that her thoughts were correct. In addition, while working as a dating coach, she received a lot of positive responses from people and her book on dating became a bestseller, so she gained more and more confidence. It’s ironic that the confidence she gained is not from her own dating experience.”

While her advice seems practical Bo-ra is secretly a romantic who binges on k-rom-coms and expects love to happen perfectly. Is it cynical to think rom-coms always promote unrealistic expectations? Not necessarily, said the actress.

“There are many touching scenes that are very romantic and unrealistic in dramas,” she said. “However, I don’t think they are only unrealistic. Many romance dramas are written based on reality and, because those dramas have been popular for a long time, those things are copied in reality. In this way, there are many couples who have a relationship that is a mix of realistic and unrealistic, so there are naturally a lot of people who have expectations. Bo-ra also watches dramas and dreams of a romantic proposal in her imagination. She is certain that she will soon become like the main character in the drama. Reality didn’t turn out the way she was hoping though.”

Bo-ra might seem to be dating the ideal man, played by 2PM’s Hwang Chansung, but it’s making her anxious that he’s taking forever to propose. He’s also cheating on her. She would be smart to follow Yoo’s real life dating advice.

“If I were to give Bo-ra dating advice, I would like to tell her that a relationship that makes you anxious is a relationship that eats away at your soul! Bo-ra! The more you cling on, the further away that love will be from you! Please stop everything and stay still! If he ever tries to come back, don’t take him back and politely thank him for getting caught cheating before marriage.”

Yoo, who has starred in the dramas The Spies Who Loved Me, Touch Your Heart, Top Star Yoo-Baek, Guardian: The Lonely and Great God, Queen and I and One More Happy Ending, enjoys acting in romantic comedies.

“We all know the feeling of falling in love, loving, arguing, breaking up, and missing someone, but the way to express and show these feelings are different so it’s fun to act because there’s a wide range of expressions,” she said. “Within the same rom-com genre, each work is different so I research a lot to make changes accordingly. In particular, this rom-com is very realistic, sad, and has a lot of comical situations, so there were a lot of challenging scenes that are a bit difficult in terms of acting. It wasn’t easy to act those scenes, but it was so much fun. I felt happy when I went to sleep feeling exhausted every day after filming.”

She liked the story of True To Love, because she felt the writer poured every feeling and experience related to love into the script. Fortunately, for her character, Bo-ra meets a better candidate for romance.

“I was touched by how the writer didn’t save anything for their next work and put every story about love they could into the series. This made me passionate about creating the precious Deborah character in an intact and precious way. You can’t cut corners. You really have to understand and express Deborah, my heart was full of feeling “That! I want to do it, I can do it!”

Yoo is a gifted comedienne, but she insists she’s still learning her craft. The more she acts, the more interesting it is, but it’s rarely predictable.

“Acting is really intricate,” said Yoo. “It’s like a fish that escapes when you try to catch it. Sometimes it works to just do what you feel on the set without studying, and sometimes it works to study like a test-taker. I think it’s very lively work because your condition on the day is a variable. I think that’s what life is like. We don’t know what’s going to happen to us, but we have to be prepared. I did my best, but sometimes it doesn’t work and sometimes unexpected luck comes, but what’s important is flexibility. I have to find the right level for the situation, and above all, I have to manage it so that my heart doesn’t get tired. I want to bravely challenge myself in the future. I learned more about how to be flexible through this series!”

Her desire to challenge herself means she’s ready for future projects.

“In the past, when I finished a project, I didn’t look at scripts for a while and took a period of rest, but now I’m looking at several scripts,” she said. “I want to hurry up and meet a good character and act.”

True To Love airs on Amazon Prime Video.