Yoo In na

Career

At the age of 16, Yoo In-na joined an entertainment agency as an apprentice singer in 1998, and even came close to joining a girl group at one point. But 11 years and five different agencies later, she was unsuccessful at breaking out. Yoo said she had difficulty memorizing the dance choreography required of K-pop singers, and after practicing her dance moves for eight hours a day, six days a week, she called it quits.

In 2006, Yoo joined YG Entertainment as an aspiring actress. She said, "If singing wasn't meant to be, I decided to give acting a go because it seemed fun. I never gave up. A lot of my friends did, though, even though they were prettier and more capable than me." Her big break came in 2009 with the popular daytime sitcom High Kick Through the Roof on MBC. Several supporting roles followed, notably as the heroine's perky best friend in 2010 hit drama Secret Garden, which won her Best New Actress at the Baeksang Arts Awards, and as the second female lead in Hong sisters' romantic comedy The Greatest Love.

She was an MC for TV Entertainment Tonight from March 3, 2011 to June 4, 2012, for which she won Best Variety Entertainer at the SBS Entertainment Awards. She is currently a DJ for KBS Cool FM's Let's Crank Up the Volume, which is the highest-rated radio program in its timeslot across both AM and FM bandwidths.

Having trained for years hoping to become a singer before her acting debut, Yoo's vocals was featured in Humming Urban Stereo's 2011 digital single "You, That Day" (넌 그날). She also sang for the soundtrack of her 2011 film My Black Mini Dress alongside her castmates Yoon Eun-hye, Park Han-byul, and Cha Ye-ryun. Their chick flick is about the lives of four twenty-something friends as they juggle life, love and work.

In 2012, Yoo starred in her first leading role in the tvN series Queen In-hyun's Man. The plot of the cable drama centers around obscure actress Choi Hee-jin, played by Yoo, who falls in love with time-traveling scholar Kim Boong-do (Ji Hyun-woo) from the Joseon Dynasty (1392-1910) who jumped 300 years to the 21st century.

She next starred in the family drama You're the Best, Lee Soon-shin, and as the female antagonist in hit fantasy romance drama My Love from the Star. Due to the popularity of My Love from the Star in China, Yoo was cast in the leading role opposite Godfrey Gao in the 2014 Chinese romantic comedy film Wedding Bible (its director Heo In-moo previously directed Yoo in My Black Mini Dress).

On March 5, 2014, Yoo began her stint as the new host of Get It Beauty, a cable program that features trends in beauty and fashion, and reviews the best cosmetic products in the market. Later that year, she starred in the mystery-romantic comedy series My Secret Hotel, where she played a wedding planner coordinating her ex-husband's wedding amidst a murder investigation.

In 2016, she starred in the romantic comedy One More Happy Ending, followed by the hit fantasy drama Guardian: The Lonely and Great God .

Personal life

At a June 7, 2012 fan meeting to mark the end of Queen In-hyun's Man, Ji Hyun-woo made a surprise public declaration that he was in love with co-star Yoo In-na, shocking fans and press alike. This sparked a media frenzy in the following days, during which their agencies remained mum on the issue and the two stars lay low, except for a reassuring message to his fans that Ji posted on Twitter on June 11. Speculation about their relationship status ended on June 17, when gossip website Sportsseoul.com photographed the couple together on a midnight date at a park in Bundang, Gyeonggi, where Yoo lives. The next day on June 18, Yoo confirmed on her radio show that they are officially dating. On May 14, 2014, their respective agencies confirmed in a press release that the couple have broken up.