Park Hae-soo

Park Hae-soo is a South Korean actor best known internationally for his role as Cho Sang-woo in the first season of the Netflix series Squid Game (2021). His performance in the acclaimed show earned him a nomination for a Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Supporting Actor in a Drama Series. Having started his artistic journey in live theater, he performed in numerous plays and musicals before building a wide-ranging screen career across television and feature films.

Born on November 21, 1981, in Suwon, South Korea, Park discovered acting in his high school theater club. In 2000, he entered the Department of Theater and Film at Dankook University with aspirations of becoming a stage actor, despite his father's strong disapproval. During his university years, he balanced his studies with part-time work at concert venues and eateries. After earning his Bachelor of Arts degree, he fulfilled his mandatory military obligation as an instructor assistant within the 50th Infantry Division.

Park debuted professionally on stage in 2007. He made his television debut in the 2012 series God of War after a director spotted him on a theater poster. After gaining broader recognition in the historical series Six Flying Dragons, he signed with BH Entertainment in 2016. His major breakthrough came when he was cast in the lead role of the drama series Prison Playbook (2017–2018). In 2019, he starred in the anthology project Persona and received the Blue Dragon Film Award for Best New Actor for By Quantum Physics: A Nightlife Venture. He followed this with the 2020 feature Time to Hunt, which premiered at the Berlin International Film Festival, and the dance-theater work Sagunja – Seasons of Change.

Following his global recognition from Squid Game in 2021, Park starred in several 2022 Netflix projects, including Yaksha: Ruthless Operations, Money Heist: Korea – Joint Economic Area, and Narco-Saints. That same year, he signed with the American talent agency UTA and hosted Saturday Night Live Korea. He returned to the stage in critically well-received productions of Faust in 2023 and The Cherry Orchard in 2024.

In 2025, Park appeared in multiple projects, including the drama series Karma and The Price of Confession, an appearance in the U.S. series Butterfly, and the disaster film The Great Flood, which became a top-ranking non-English title on Netflix. In 2026, he starred in the crime series The Scarecrow, contributing a soundtrack cover and winning the Blue Dragon Series Award for Best Actor.

Outside of performing, Park is an avid drawer who presented collaborative artwork at the Kiaf SEOUL art fair in 2022. He has supported charitable causes, donating royalties from a 2020 audiobook reading project to assist theater workers and donating ₩30 million to wildfire relief in 2025. Park married in Seoul in January 2019, and he and his wife have two sons, born in September 2021 and August 2026.