MY PRESIDENT: A Musical Reframing of Democracy

On August 29, 2025, at the Bucheon Citizens Hall Grand Theater, the musical MY PRESIDENT will premiere, a new original musical that revisits the turbulent arc of Korea’s modern history through the life of Kim Daejung, the former president who embodied both resilience and reconciliation.

This is not a political biography set to music. Rather, MY PRESIDENT stages the contradictions of a man who refused to bend in the face of suffering, yet allowed himself to be vulnerable in love. The production explores how Kim’s unwavering defense of peace, human rights, forgiveness, and reconciliation continues to echo as urgent questions for today.

 

From Jangchungdan Park to the Seoul Spring

The musical starts off from 1971, with Kim as a young opposition candidate electrifying crowds at Jangchungdan Park during the presidential election. Hopes for change are quickly suffocated by fraud and the authoritarian Yushin regime. What follows is a sequence of defining episodes: the abduction in Tokyo, house arrest in Donggyo-dong, the Busan–Masan protests, and the assassination of Park Chunghee.

The brief optimism of the “Seoul Spring” collapses under military rule, as Kim is arrested once again. On stage, these moments are not framed as history lessons but as provocations: reminders of how fragile democracy remains.

Exile, Defiance, and Return

After the Gwangju Uprising is crushed, Kim is sentenced to death. From prison he speaks of forgiveness, not revenge. Exiled to the United States, he refuses silence: appearing on television in self-taught English, carrying protest signs through city streets, demanding global attention for Korea’s democratic struggle.

Even when threatened with imprisonment upon return, he comes back — and the people march with him. The path traced in the musical runs directly to the 1987 democratic uprising and, decades later, to the candlelight squares that redefined civic action in Korea.

The Man Behind the Myth - Kim Daejung

Director Kwon Hosung explains the production’s intent:

“Not the politician Kim Daejung, but the man — the one who never bowed to pain, yet could soften before love. That is the Kim Daejung I wanted to bring to the stage.”

Strength and tenderness, contradiction and coherence: these are the tensions that give the musical its emotional force. Kim is not presented as a statue from the past, but as a voice that continues to reverberate.

Cast and Director

The role of Kim Daejung is performed by Ahn Deokyong, with Son Hyunjung as Lee Heeho and Cho Hwi as Yuk Seungeop, joined by a cast of more than thirty actors and a full chorus.

- Written by Jin Namsu

- Directed by Kwon Hosung

- Music by Lee Sula

- Choreography by Choi Byunggyu and Oh Suyun

Following a successful showcase in Mokpo in 2023, the production now arrives in Bucheon for a two-month run.

Musical Information

Title: MY PRESIDENT

Venue: Bucheon Citizens Hall Grand Theater

Dates: August 29 – October 26, 2025 (VIP preview August 28)

Organizer: Cooperative Sonesone

Supported by: Kim Daejung Peace Center

MY PRESIDENT is not a tribute to the past.

It is a reminder that Kim Daejung’s footsteps remain on the road we walk today — and that democracy is never a finished structure, but a work in progress.

The values he fought for — peace, human rights, forgiveness, reconciliation — are restaged here not as nostalgia, but as a challenge.

The musical leaves us with a simple assertion: the stage of democracy is not over. It is our turn now.