Buzz-worthy K-drama The Penthouse: War in Life doesn’t have huge names. But a closer look shows a cast made up of veteran actors, comeback queens, former K-pop idols and new talent. Some of the villains have starred as romcom leads before, and their image then was far from the icy, spiteful exterior they display in this drama. 5 times we really should have guessed Hyun Bin and Son Ye-jin were dating IRL View this post on Instagram A post shared by SBS 드라마 공식계정 (@sbsdrama.official) Check out these clips of three The Penthouse cast members before they joined the hottest murder mystery on our screens. Kim So-yeon View this post on Instagram A post shared by 김소연 (@sysysy1102) A lead character and a villain at the same time, Kim So-yeon plays a wicked but famous soprano and musical school director named Cheon Seo-jin. What put her on the map way back when – and perhaps informed this role – was her manipulative role in the highly rated melodrama, All About Eve (2000). Prior to that, Kim won a brand-sponsored beauty pageant (Miss Binggrae) at age 14, helping her snag some minor roles in TV dramas and a hosting spot on the popular music show, Inkigayo . Can K-drama go even more global in 2021 with woke, relevant storylines? The actress is praised for being kind and thoughtful in real life, unlike her scheming on-screen roles. And, though they weren’t all such huge hits, she has played the female lead female roles in romcoms, including in We Got Married opposite Kwak Si-yang (she married actor Lee Sang-woo in reality). Lee Ji-ah View this post on Instagram A post shared by E.JIAH 이지아 (@e.jiah) Lee Ji-ah plays Shim Su-ryeon, the glamorous queen of the Hera Palace penthouse. She was born into wealth but doesn’t sing or play any musical instrument in the drama, unlike her children and her rivals. Lee herself majored in graphic design and lived in the US for about 10 years. She made her Korean entertainment debut in a commercial and then a series called The Legend – both with Winter Sonata star Bae Yong-joon. After that, and more than a decade before Penthouse , she played a musician in a 2008 series Beethoven Virus. She also starred in shows like My Mister with IU and The Ghost Detective. K-pop idol IU is starring in a movie by Japanese auteur Hirokazu Kore-eda Eugene View this post on Instagram A post shared by 유진_eugene (@eugene810303) This youthful-looking actress plays Oh Yoon-hee, Cheon Seo-Jin’s main rival. As avid K-pop fans would know, Eugene started out in the girl group S.E.S. Formed in 1997, the super-successful trio sold 3.6 million albums, making them South Korea’s best-selling girl group, a record only broken by Twice in 2019. Are K-pop girl groups like Blackpink too objectified? Eugene has starred in a number of K-dramas and a few films since the early 2000s, including Save the Last Dance for Me with Ji Sung and Love Truly with Lee Min-ki. She was also cast as a co-host of the variety show Happy Together Friends in 2007. More recently, in 2016 , she appeared in various episodes of a hit variety show, The Return of Superman, with her daughter and husband. Want more stories like this? Sign up here . Follow STYLE on Facebook , Instagram , YouTube and Twitter .