Life is Easier If You're Handsome novel Chapter 252

About seven years ago.

Back when Kim Donghu publicly criticized High Dream 2.

“....”

Lee Minha felt like her world was collapsing.

She didn’t show it on the outside, not to anyone.

But inside, her pale face masked a heart frozen in time.

“Donghu...”

To be honest, she had been somewhat arrogant.

High Dream 1 had been such a success. If she was offering him the lead role in the sequel,

she thought for sure he would accept without hesitation.

But her expectation was completely wrong.

From that moment, Kim Donghu took off like a madman.

A few years later, as if the country was too small for him,

he started hopping around internationally, showcasing his talents with ease.

And with every move, Lee Minha’s bar for who could lead her scripts rose higher and higher.

“It’s not that I’m picky! I only ever had one standard!”

“Kim Donghu?”

“Yes! That’s right! Donghu! I... I want him to pick up my script again... to act, okay? I want him to act.”

That day when Lee Jaei stepped off the script’s page,

Lee Minha was still trapped in that very day.

Lee Jaei, pouring out hatred at the piano—

she wanted desperately to see that again.

But at the same time, she was scared.

“What if he rejects it again? What if... what if I get turned down again?”

And unlike the High Dream days,

Kim Donghu was now getting bombarded with scripts from every direction.

In that kind of situation, for her script—the one he had already once rejected—to get picked?

She couldn’t even imagine it lightly.

So Lee Minha worked tirelessly, refining her screenplay.

She wrote with everything she had, to make it so good he couldn’t say no.

She created other works. Gained experience.

And finally—The Pianist was born.

“It’s done! It’s finally done!”

When the script was finished,

Lee Minha sent it first to domestic broadcasting stations.

“It’s too ❖ Nоvеl𝚒ght ❖ (Exclusive on Nоvеl𝚒ght) brutal. Tweaking a few things won’t fix it—we can’t do it.”

“I really wanted to, but this is just... sorry.”

“Instead of this, how about pushing it more into the romance genre? There’s a hint of it in there. You could expand that...”

When she didn’t get the response she wanted, she turned straight to OTT.

To be honest, she had her eyes on Netflix.

Given the current market, they had the broader user base—

so it felt like the logical choice.

But then—

“We’re not particularly interested. Even if you’re considering Kim Donghu for the lead.”

Netflix, which she had thought was a sure thing, rejected her coldly.

“If you’re willing to adjust some parts—like not showing the orphanage child—we’re open to signing.”

It was Dezni, feeling stifled by their stagnant content, who readily accepted the project.

From there, everything started falling into place.

The only concern left was whether or not Kim Donghu would agree.

So Lee Minha sent out the first draft with a “screw it, whatever happens” mindset.

It wasn’t adjusted for mainstream tastes.

It was the raw, most brutal version of The Pianist she had written.

But she included the most compelling elements in the email as well.

And the result—

“Veritas replied! He said yes!”

“For real? Holy shit! Holy shit!”

—was a complete success.

***

Right after sending the confirmation email,

almost as if she’d been waiting, Writer Lee Minha called.

It had been a while since we’d last spoken.

After the usual greetings, we dove straight into work talk.

“Oh, this is the draft version? So originally... yeah, okay.”

And that’s when I found out—

the Pianist script I had just read was actually a draft.

She told me the revised version would be somewhat toned down.

—I’m sorry, really... I just wanted to get your attention somehow.

“Haha.”

—You wouldn’t even look at my script otherwise...

“...”

Wow, she’s still using that old meme.

Wait. Wasn’t that actually still relevant in 2020?

“Sorry for baiting you, I just wanted to show you this”—

that line might still be trending even now.

If anything, it was surprisingly era-accurate.

—Anyway... there won’t be any scenes with kids. Just the killing part will stay.

“Oh, like, just mentions of them?”

—Yeah. All the victims are adults anyway.

And when she told me they’d removed the cannibalism entirely,

I understood why she had sent me the rough version in the first place.

She wanted me to fully understand the backstory.

Not just read what was in the script—

but grasp the depth behind the details she didn’t include.

That’s probably how she wanted to raise the quality of the work even more.

The conversation kept going like that for a while.

And just as we were about to wrap up—

—Oh, right. Piano consultation... Chairman Edward Park agreed to do it.

“What?”

That caught me completely off guard.

***

"Hohohohoho!"

The day the MEET music video was released to the world,

Edward Park was practically dancing in place.

Some might say it was undignified for a man in his fifties—

but he didn’t care.

“Donghu’s playing never fails to lift my spirits.”

Because something far more important was happening.

To put it bluntly,