'Sugar Man' producer shares untold stories
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JTBC’s chief producer Yoon Hyun-joon
By Kim Jae-heun
JTBC’s chief producer Yoon Hyun-joon shared behind-the-scenes stories of his recent music entertainment show “Two Yoo Project ― Sugar Man” during a press conference at the JTBC building in Digital Media City, western Seoul, Tuesday.
The music entertainment show first started with two-episode pilots aired last August. Yoon was inspired by 2012 Swedish-British documentary featuring Sixto Rodriguez, an American musician who disappeared from the public eye in the United States but relived his glory in South Africa.
JTBC’s entertainment show is presented by Yoo Jae-suk, You Hee-yeol, Kim Eana and Sandara Park, who are divided into two pairs to introduce each other’s “Sugar Man,” a singer who was once popular but has faded into obscurity. The teams also invite currently popular producers to remake Sugar Man’s old hit songs into new versions that will better appeal in today’s music industry. At the end of the show, the “Sugar Man” from each group fields their new song and the audience divided by age groups votes for the winner.
“The gist of our show is Sugar Man. It is important to tell why our Sugar Men disappeared and which great songs have he or she left for audiences. I believe the show’s strength lays on highlighting great old hits and sharing them with the young generation,” said Yoon.
The show started with low viewership of 1 percent despite casting the country’s top emcees like Yoo Jae-suk and Yoo Hee-yeol. The show was close to cancelation but Yoon adopted a new system to divide the audience by age, which enhanced sympathetic responses from the different generations. The music show reached the highest viewership by penetrating 5 percent in six months.
“I recalled why we were not successful with the show’s pilot because we thought that everyone would welcome old great artists. But, not to talk about teenagers and 20-somethings, even 30-somethings did not recognize many of the artists that we featured (in the early episodes). We had to acknowledge the difference, so we adopted the new system, which revived the show,” Yoon said.
The chief producer went on to explain that curiosity is the start of his music show. A person can listen to the radio and come across an old song and wonder about the singer’s whereabout.
“Sugar Man has not only music, but also memory, empathy and story in it, which are the strengths of the show. We have competition in the end but that is not the gist. The last battle is one scene of a music festival,” added Yoon.