South Korean actress Lee Joo-Sil, a star in the second season of “Squid Game,” has died.
She was 81.
The veteran actress collapsed in cardiac arrest at home in Uijeongbu, South Korea, on Sunday, three months after being diagnosed with stomach cancer, The Korea Times reported. She was brought to a hospital but could not be revived.
Joo-Sil played Park Mal Soon, the doting mother of undercover detective Hwang Jun Ho (Wi Ha Joon) and stepmother of Hwang In Ho (Lee Byung Hun), in the first two episodes of Season 2.
It was the culmination of a six-decade career that saw her blossom from stage actress to television and movies.
Born March 8, 1944, Joo-Sil launched her career in 1964 and began appearing onstage in 1965, rising to prominence in the theater scene with starring roles in a slew of acclaimed productions, The Korea Times noted. She also worked as a voice actress, according to IMDb.
She eventually moved to television and movies, making her mark in such films as zombie thriller “Train to Busan” in 2016 and “The Uncanny Counter” in 2020, according to People.
This was not Joo-Sil’s first bout with cancer. She had beaten breast cancer 13 years after a 1993 diagnosis gave her just a year to live.
Working throughout those health struggles, Joo-Sil took her career from the theater to TV and movies, The Korea Times reported, and earned a public health doctorate from Wonkwang University.
“Everyone becomes stronger when faced with a crisis,” she told an interviewer in 2023. “If you let everything go, you become helpless. When I was contacted by a film company to work with them, I said, ‘I’m sick,’ and they said, ‘That’s an illness, and we’re working.’ I was grateful for that kind of thinking.”
The actress also appeared in 2022’s “It’s Beautiful Now,” the series “Country Diaries” from 1980 through 2002, and “Beauty and Mr. Romantic,” Deadline noted. She was honored as a Best Supporting Actress in 2023’s Wildflower Film Festival, which celebrates Korean independent and low-budget films.
