Jisoo's former agency ordered to pay 880 million KRW over his sudden exit from 'River Where the Moon Rises'

Actor Jisoo's school bullying scandal back in 2021 caused absolute chaos, and the mess from his sudden exit from the KBS drama 'River Where the Moon Rises' is finally over, but it's costing his old agency a fortune. 

According to the legal community on the 6th, Jisoo's former agency, KeyEast, withdrew their final appeal to the Supreme Court back on June 25. Because they dropped the fight, the previous court decision is now final, meaning KeyEast has no choice but to pay the drama's production company, Canvas N (formerly Victory Contents), a staggering 880 million KRW (which is around $573,900) in damages.

To understand why the damages were so high, it helps to look back at the situation behind the scenes when the bullying allegations first surfaced online. Jisoo admitted to some of the accusations and voluntarily stepped down from the show while it was literally still airing. 

The biggest issue was that filming had already been finished all the way through episode 18 of the 20 episodes. Since they had no choice but to reshoot everything, the production company brought in Na Inwoo at the last minute to replace him and save the show. 

They had to re-film almost the entire series while keeping up with the broadcast schedule. Na Inwoo took over starting from episode 7, and they reshot everything from that point forward. Once things finally calmed down a bit, they went backward and re-filmed episodes 1 through 6 just to keep the whole show consistent. 

Because of the massive extra costs, Canvas N sued KeyEast for 3 billion KRW (which is around $1,957,200). They argued that they suffered severe financial losses from having to redo everything from scratch, including extra staff costs, location and equipment rental fees, cast fees, art department expenses, and a ton of other production costs. 

The legal battle went back and forth for a while. At first, the court agreed with the production company and ordered KeyEast to pay 1.42 billion KRW (which is around $926,400). But then, when the case went to a higher appeals court, that amount was cut down to the final 880 million KRW. 

Since Canvas N wasn't happy with that reduction, they tried to take it to the Supreme Court, but the court completely dismissed their request. Now that KeyEast has also dropped its own appeal, this long legal battle is officially over, leaving the agency with a very expensive bill.