Among the roster of new K-dramas coming to Netflix this month, the mystery-thriller Green Mothers’ Club has already been making a buzz for its quirky plot. The show follows a group of five mothers in a competitive grade school community with their own secrets and dramas to hide. Actress Lee Yo-won plays the leading role of Lee Eun-pyo, an ordinary housewife with a prestigious education who studied abroad in France. In an interview quoted by Soompi , Lee shared the reason she took the project. “The most attractive thing was that it expressed women’s lives in varied and three-dimensional ways. While reading the script, I sympathised a lot with Lee Eun-pyo and the other mothers in the Green Mothers’ Club .” 5 times Blackpink’s Lisa proved she’s Thailand’s unofficial princess Fans are ecstatic to watch Lee in her new role, starring opposite actresses like Choo Ja-hyun and Jang Hye-jin. Here are a few interesting facts about the Korean star you need to know. 1. She started her career as a cover model Lee’s journey to fame started after she won a modelling contest back in high school and appeared as a cover model for Figaro fashion magazine in 1997. After a few commercial stints, Lee pivoted to acting in 1998 in the anarchic comedy Attack the Gas Station (1999) followed by the controversial romance TV drama Blue Mist (2001). Her first big break came from the critically-acclaimed 2001 film Take Care of My Cat where she starred opposite Bae Doona. Lee won best new actress at the Blue Dragon Film Awards and the Baeksang Arts Awards for the role. 5 things to know about Park Seo-joon, Marvel’s next Korean star However, after a string of less popular films, Lee took a career break in 2002 and returned to acting three years after getting married and giving birth. 2. She found fame in period dramas After her hiatus, Lee began to appear in more period dramas and found mainstream success in the genre. She first appeared in SBS’s Fashion 70’s in 2005, which depicts Korean female designers of the era. She then joined an ensemble cast for the film May 18, which chronicles the Gwangju massacre and became one of the highest-grossing Korean films of all time. Lee’s global stardom came in 2009 when she portrayed the role of Korea’s Queen Seondeok of Silla in the eponymous period drama that ran for 62 episodes on MBC. The show was so popular that it was aired in Japan, Taiwan and the United States. Lee was even invited to discuss her role in a Japanese talk show. She confessed that she was scared at first to accept the role as she worried whether she could do justice to the real-life character. “I was joyful and fearful at the same time. I was so tense during the first day shoot as we shot the combat scene. But because of the difficulties I was able to discover something new about myself and it was fun,” Lee said. The show’s taxing schedule also took a toll on Lee, and she was forced to take a two-day break to deal with her poor health, reports AllKpop. After her success in the period drama, Lee wowed audiences with her 2010 performance in The Recipe and in the 2011’s fantasy melodrama 49 Days. She also made an impression in My Horrible Boss (2016) opposite Yoon Sang-hyun. 3. She has also appeared in music videos The 42-year-old actress has also appeared in a handful of music videos throughout her career. She first appeared in Deep’s Please Baby Don’t Cry and has also featured in SeeYa’s music videos Love’s Greeting and Ice Doll . 5 K-drama actresses who married ultra-rich husbands She was last seen in Yangpa’s Love Is All The Same, released in 2012, starring opposite actor Baek Sung-hyun in the romantic music clip. 4. She loves to work out with her husband In 2003, Lee surprised fans when she married businessman and pro golfer Park Jin-woo at the age of 23. The two have three children together, with their youngest born in 2015. During an interview for her film The Recipe , Lee confessed that she often joins her husband when he works out and enjoys working out more with him. As reported by Han Cinema, the Korean star said, “I’m working out lately all because my husband loves weight training. My focus area is muscular strength and this increased my muscle percentage, thanks to my husband.” The 170cm-tall actress also shared that she enjoys weight training, but is not too keen on golfing. “I didn’t learn much and I couldn’t play golf for a long time. I’m planning to start playing golf again, but weight training just won’t let me go.” 5. She doesn’t like acting in romantic comedies The Dankook University graduate studied in the theatre and film department and apparently took nine years to graduate (she finally did in 2008) as she was busy honing her acting career. 6 K-pop idols who are ‘human luxury brands’, from V to Jennie While many Korean actresses have dabbled in the romantic comedy genre, Lee tried to set herself apart by taking unconventional roles and established herself as more of a serious actress. “Strangely, I hated trendy dramas when I was in my early twenties. I kept going after the conventional ones. I wanted to work with senior actors and learn how they can act so well. I wasn’t drawn to characters of similar ages telling pretty love stories,” she told Ten Asia. Want more stories like this? Follow STYLE on Facebook , Instagram , YouTube and Twitter .