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| Actor Kim Seon-ho is faced with the allegation that he forced his ex-girlfriend to get an abortion by falsely promising to marry her afterwards. Courtesy of tvN |
SALT Entertainment looking into the allegation, apologizes for any concern
By Lee Gyu-lee
Actor Kim Seon-ho, who shot to stardom in tvN's romance series, "Start-Up," followed by "Hometown Cha-Cha-Cha," is facing the allegation that he forced an ex-girlfriend to get an abortion.
The actor's agency, SALT Entertainment, released a brief statement Tuesday, about two days after the accusation was made, saying that it was "verifying" whether it is true or not.
"As we have not confirmed the truth behind the case, we ask for your patience," it said. "We are truly sorry to cause any concern with such an unpleasant issue."
The accusation was raised when a user, claiming to be the ex-girlfriend of a rising star initialed, "K," shared a post on an online community.
She claimed that she got pregnant while dating the actor last year and was falsely persuaded with the promise of marriage in order to agree to have an abortion. She wrote that he had promised to marry her in two years and said that he would ask her to move in with him in a year.
"I told K that the doctor said if I get an abortion now, it might be hard for me to get pregnant again… and I still have his outrageous response to my message," the user wrote. "He came to my house and tried to persuade me for days until I agreed to get an abortion."
The user added that he had even told her that he would need to pay off hundreds of millions of won for violating advertising contracts if she were to decide to have the baby. But after she had the abortion, she said he changed his tune and broke up with her over the phone.
Although she did not specifically name the star, many people soon identified the man as Kim, as the descriptions of him in the post matched the actor.
Soon after the accusation went viral online, some of the companies that had featured Kim in advertising campaigns took action to remove images of the actor from their websites and social media accounts. The pizza franchise, Domino's, removed photos and videos of Kim from its official website, YouTube and Instagram.
Kim was scheduled for interviews with local reporters on Wednesday, regarding his recent series, "Hometown Cha-Cha-Cha," which ended in success on Sunday. But the actor's agency canceled the interviews a day before, due to "the agency's internal issues."
The series' co-stars Shin Min-a, Lee Sang-yi and Jo Han-chul also canceled their upcoming interviews with reporters, scheduled for this week.
Kim debuted in 2009 as a theater actor with the comedy play, "New Boeing Boeing." He played the lead and supporting roles in various TV shows, including, "Welcome to Waikiki 2" and "Catch the Ghost," before his breakthrough role in the tvN series, "Start-Up," in 2020.
He is set to star in various projects, including the romantic comedy film, "Two O'Clock Date," with singer-actress Lim Yoon-a, and the drama film, "Dog Days," along with actresses Youn Yuh-jung and Kim Yun-jin. Kim has been appearing in KBS's famous variety show, "Two Days and One Night," since 2019.
