You Can Hire a Real-Life ‘Wedding Ringer’ in South Korea
The plot for January’s Kevin Hart-Josh Gad comedy The Wedding Ringer was more deeply steeped in reality than we thought.
NPR reported today on the phenomenon of “wedding guest rentals,” a South Korean industry that’s apparently been growing since the late 1990s. According to the report, wedding guests are typically paid “about $20” to attend the nuptials of a couple who wants to appear more popular than they are.
“The logic in South Korea is this: You can rent chairs and venues for weddings — why not guests?,” Hu writes. Lee Hyun-su, who runs a “casting agency” for such events, said he has a database of more than 20,000 “actors” available not only for weddings, but all other types of events and circumstances. “We’re talking fake bosses, fake parents, fake mistresses,” Hu reports. “Lee has cast them all.” (Wait, why would someone need a fake mistress?)
In The Wedding Ringer, Gad plays Doug Harris, a newly engaged tax attorney so socially awkward, he’s got no one to call on when it becomes time to assemble his groomsmen. He then hires Hart’s character, Jimmy Callahan, owner and CEO of “Best Man, Inc.” to staff his wedding party and act like his closest bro.
So much for your critique that the comedy had a “cockamamie premise,” Richard Roeper.
Watch The Wedding Ringer trailer:
