Choi Kang Hee's New Character Has A Problem

It's not just male characters that will visit a psychiatrist in the year's upcoming dramas. In "Heart To Heart," Choi Kang Hee plays a woman whose social anxiety drives her to have a heart-to-heart talk with a therapist.

Choi plays Cha Hong Do, a woman who blushes uncontrollably when she feels anxious. This tendency sends her to the therapy couch and eventually into the arms of a doctor, Go I Suk, played by Chun Jung Myung. He's the right doctor for her because she finds that she does not blush in front of him. But she will discover that he has some healing of his own to do. He became a recluse after the death of his brother.

Choi Kang Hee is the latest in a succession of k-drama characters that need help from a mental health professional. In 2014, there was Jo In Sung playing a delusional radio personality. He consulted and fell in love with a psychiatrist played by Gong Hyo Jin. In the upcoming drama "Kill Me, Heal Me," Ji Sung plays a man with dissociative disorder who visits a personal therapist played by Hwang Jung Eum.

In "Hyde, Jekyll and I" Hyun Bin also plays a man with more than one personality but he will get help from a circus master rather than a therapist.

And despite her social anxiety and desire to dress like an old lady to avoid being looked at, "Heart To Heart" heroine Cha Hong Do has an admirer. Lee Jae Yoon, last seen in the dramas "Golden Rainbow" and "Cruel City" and the film "Venus Talk," plays her admirer, Detective Jang Do Soo.

Cha Hong Do not only dresses in old woman's clothes to avoid being noticed but she has taken over the life of an old woman. When her only friend, an elderly lady, passes away, she takes her clothes and gets a job as a housekeeper.

It's Choi Kang Hee's first role in two years and she has described it as a challenging one. She last appeared in the comedy "Level 7 Civil Servant" with Joo Won. And it will be a challenge for the beautiful actress to look like someone you would not notice on the street.

The drama will also be her first chance to reunite with director Lee Yoon Jung, whom she worked with in the 2005 drama "Beating Heart. Lee Yoon Jung was also the director of "Coffee Prince," so fans of that popular drama are eager to see his latest work.

"Heart To Heart" begins on Jan. 9 and will air Fridays and Saturdays on tvN.