Minari’s Youn Yuh-jung thanks ‘snobbish’ Brits for voting for her at the BAFTAs

Youn Yuh-jung thanked “snobbish” Brits for voting her for Best Supporting Actress at the BAFTAs.

The 73-year-old South Korean actress was honoured at the EE BAFTA Film Awards on Sunday (April 11) for her role as Soonja in ‘Minari’ and she garnered a laugh from the virtual live audience as she admitted she was incredibly shocked to have received the award because the British are known to be a bit “snobbish”.

In her acceptance speech, she said: “Wow Britain! I am Korean actress, Yuh-Jung Youn, and I don’t know what to say. I’m very honoured to be nominated for this award… First, I’d like to express my deep condolences for your Duke of Edinburgh and thank you so much for this award.

“Every award means a lot but this one, especially recognised by British people known as very snobbish people, who chose me as the winner – I’m very grateful. Thank you very much.”

The comment set the virtual audience into fits of giggles and when the screen cut back to host Dermot O’Leary, he was seen pulling a funny face and smiling at the camera as the show continued on.

Youn has also been nominated for an Oscar and she previously admitted her movie “bought her a lot of gifts”.

She said: “Me, a 73-year-old Asian woman could have never even dreamed about being nominated for an Oscar. Minari brought me a lot of gifts… It’s embarrassing.

“Most people fell in love with the movies or fell in love with theatre. But in my case, it was just an accident… To tell you the truth, I didn’t know what acting was. I tried to memorise the line and do whatever they asked me to do. At the time, I didn’t know if I was enjoying it or if I disliked it.”