Styling by Kelvin Seah of Rouge Artists
Grooming by Mary Klimek of Rouge Artists

 

On a sunny May afternoon, Will Yun Lee stands on a four-foot-tall concrete barricade alongside a strip mall parking lot. Clad in an all-black blazer and jeans ensemble, he carefully swings one foot in front of the other as the photographer follows his steps from the sidewalk, snapping the first shots of the day.

“Only for KoreAm would you put your life in danger,” Will says, holding his arms out for balance. With his hair tied back into his signature low-ponytail, he plants his feet apart, furrows his brow and gazes intensely into the camera. Two middle-aged women walk by and stare.

When the photographer signals a break, Will leaps to the ground, landing sneakers-first onto the pavement. 

“OK, we’re done,” he declares. “Let’s go get some soju.”

Koreatown, Los Angeles. It’s a familiar playground for the 32-year-old actor. He suggested the backdrop for the daylong photo shoot and our editors enthusiastically agreed. There’s something about the raw, urban district that screams Will Yun Lee. Walking toward the nighttime hotspot Café Bleu for an outfit change, past a Korean video store and a shop serving big bowls of jampbong, the man seems at home. 

Inside the air-conditioned lounge, Will jokes that he should jump behind the vacated bar and pour a round of drinks. He leans over the sleek bar top and takes a peek at the inventory. 

“I have many interesting memories here at Café Bleu,” he says with a sly smile. “Too many.”

When the reporter asks him to dish some stories, he laughs and tugs at her notebook: “Hey, WHAT ARE YOU WRITING?”

Playful and disarmingly funny, Will is at a rest stop on his dizzying Hollywood journey. On Sept. 26, TV audiences will watch him in action with the premiere of his NBC series “Bionic Woman,” a dark reinvention of the ‘70s sci-fi drama. The show is about a woman named Jaime (Michelle Ryan), who receives bionic body parts after a near-fatal car accident. Will plays Jae, the specialized operations leader of the bionics team, who trains Jaime how to control her new superhuman powers and use them to execute top secret, spy-style missions. 

While the show has already generated major pre-season buzz — due in part to the controversial casting of Isaiah Washington, who was fired from “Grey’s Anatomy” after dropping an anti-gay slur — Will speaks about the series with careful optimism. “We’ll see if we can last more than six episodes,” he says calmly. “Whenever you do a pilot, you have to be pretty reserved about it. You can’t be too emotionally attached. 

“But,” he adds. “I’m pretty amazed at how good it is.”

For the moment, Will doesn’t seem to be feeling any pressure. Sitting in the passenger’s seat on the van ride to the next photo spot, he looks behind him to chat with the three female crewmembers squeezed in the back. With his view obstructed by a large silkscreen the photographer propped up in front of them, Will instead conducts his own version of “The Dating Game.”