Song Hye-kyo and Gong Yoo's Tantara Sets December 11 Netflix Premiere

A December Debut for a Drama About the Price of Success

Song Hye-kyo and Gong Yoo will make their first appearance together in Netflix's Tantara on December 11, 2026, in a drama set inside South Korea's entertainment industry from the 1960s through the 1980s. The series brings together writer Noh Hee-kyung and director Lee Yoon-jung, with a reported production budget of 80 billion won.

Netflix has announced a worldwide release for the series, whose Korean title, Cheoncheonhee Gangryeolhage, is translated as Slowly and Intensely. It has also appeared under the working English title Show Business. Release coverage specifies Friday, December 11, at 5 p.m.

The story follows people who enter the entertainment business with little money and large ambitions. Song plays Min-ja, who survives a childhood of poverty before entering the recording industry. Gong plays Dong-gu, her childhood friend, who follows her into that world and helps her pursue her dreams.

Kim Seol-hyun, Cha Seung-won, Lee Ha-nui and Na Moon-hee complete the principal ensemble. Their characters bring singers, a powerful composer, aspiring managers and people from different generations into a story that places the work behind entertainment alongside the performances audiences see.

Childhood Friends Enter the Recording Business

Min-ja's ambition grows out of necessity. As a child, she has to take whatever work brings in money. Her difficult upbringing gives her a determined personality, and she eventually sees the recording industry as a chance to build a different life.

Dong-gu shares that history. He and Min-ja endure hardship together before entering the music business. His personality is described as unpredictable, yet he listens to Min-ja and remains close to her as they pursue her goals.

The newly released poster traces their progress through several kinds of work, including jobs as waiters, before they become novice managers. Promotional descriptions use the term mojji for these newcomers to management. For readers unfamiliar with the expression, the essential point is their position: they are starting near the bottom of the business.

That route gives the central friendship a practical setting. Min-ja and Dong-gu have to earn a living while trying to move into an industry where other people already hold influence. Their shared past connects the childhood scenes to the working lives that follow.

Min-hee and Gil-yeo Bring Ambition and Influence

Kim Seol-hyun plays Min-hee, an aspiring performer whose relationship with Min-ja combines affection and resentment. The two have known each other since childhood, giving their later encounters a history that reaches beyond professional competition.

Min-hee is bold and determined to succeed in her own way. Her character description also presents a tension between following Min-ja's lead and developing a more calculating, rebellious streak. Both women seek a place in the same industry, but their ambitions do not always point them in the same direction.

Cha Seung-won plays Seok Gil-yeo, a composer with enough influence to turn an unknown singer into a major star. While Min-ja and Dong-gu are finding their footing, he already occupies a position of power within the music business.

The contrast helps explain the world the newcomers are entering. A singer needs opportunities to perform and record, while a composer such as Gil-yeo can help determine who receives material capable of making a career. His role places the creation of music close to the distribution of opportunity.

Two More Generations Join the Story

Lee Ha-nui plays Yang-ja, Min-hee's mother, who continues to dream of becoming a singer despite difficult circumstances. Her ambition places a parent and daughter within the same broad pursuit of musical success.

Yang-ja's presence expands the story beyond young people seeking their first chance. She carries an ambition that has survived into motherhood, while Min-hee is trying to establish her own direction. Their family relationship adds another connection to an ensemble already tied together by childhood friendships and professional goals.

Na Moon-hee appears as Mal-soon. The release poster presents her with an expression suggesting the joys and hardships of a long life. Her appearance brings an older generation into a drama whose setting stretches across three decades.

Min-ja, Dong-gu, Min-hee, Gil-yeo and Yang-ja occupy different positions around the music industry. Some are trying to enter it, one has considerable power within it, and others continue to pursue dreams through hardship. Those positions give the ensemble different stakes in the same pursuit of success.

A Turntable Organizes the New Poster

Netflix's release announcement is accompanied by a poster built around a turntable, the device used to play vinyl records. Around it, scenes from the characters' lives form a panorama, linking childhood, paid work and musical performance within one image.

Min-ja and Dong-gu appear at different stages of their journey. Their scenes move from the poverty they endure as children to the jobs they take as adults and their beginnings as managers. The design makes the passage of time a central part of the promotion.

Min-hee appears singing, while Gil-yeo plays the saxophone. Yang-ja is also shown singing, with an expression that combines urgency and enjoyment. Mal-soon's portrait adds a quieter image of someone carrying the experience of earlier years.

The poster brings the story's different kinds of labor into view. Waiting tables, managing performers, composing and singing all belong to its picture of the entertainment world. The turntable connects those activities to the finished records around which the characters' ambitions gather.

Noh Hee-kyung Returns to Familiar Creative Ground

Noh Hee-kyung returns with her first new series in about four years and six months, following Our Blues in 2022. Her earlier writing credits include Lie in 1998, Worlds Within in 2008, That Winter, the Wind Blows in 2013 and It's Okay, That's Love in 2014.

Song previously starred in Worlds Within and That Winter, the Wind Blows, making Tantara another collaboration between the actor and writer. Worlds Within also dealt with people working in entertainment, although its setting was television production rather than the earlier recording business portrayed here.

Lee Yoon-jung directs the series. GTist, Studio Dragon and Imaginus are the production companies behind it. Together, the writer, director and producers are building a story that follows several connected lives across the 1960s, 1970s and 1980s.

The period setting is described as an entertainment world marked by violence and harsh treatment. Against that setting, the characters pursue success from very different starting points. Poverty, loyalty, rivalry and professional influence are all built into the announced character relationships.

A First Partnership for Song and Gong

Song and Gong have each led major screen productions, but Tantara is their first project together. Their roles give them a connection that begins long before their characters enter the recording industry: Min-ja and Dong-gu have already lived through difficult childhood years side by side.

Song's next series follows her film Dark Nuns. It is also described as the first project to be released after her move to a new agency. Here, she plays a woman whose opportunity in music comes after years of doing whatever work she can find.

Gong returns roughly two years after his Netflix appearances in The Trunk and Squid Game season two. As Dong-gu, he plays someone whose ambitions are closely bound to another person's dream, with his loyalty to Min-ja forming a central part of the character.

The wider cast gives the drama several relationships beyond that lead pairing. Min-ja and Min-hee share a difficult emotional history, Yang-ja and Min-hee are mother and daughter, and Gil-yeo holds the professional influence that newcomers hope to reach.

The Budget, Episode Count and Release Timeline

The production budget has been reported at 80 billion won, while a series listing gives Tantara 22 episodes. The budget figure comes from industry reporting. Episode running times and whether all 22 installments will arrive together have not been specified.

The scale matters to the viewing commitment. A story spanning three decades and an ensemble of connected characters has room to follow changes in work, ambition and relationships over time. The announced poster already presents childhood and adulthood as parts of that longer progression.

The main dates and periods attached to the production are:

• 1960s through the 1980s: The period in which the drama's entertainment industry story takes place.
• 2022: The release year of Noh Hee-kyung's previous series, Our Blues.
• January 12, 2025: The reported start of filming for Tantara.
• December 11, 2026: The announced Netflix premiere date, with release coverage giving a time of 5 p.m.

For viewers, the immediate promise is a story about the people trying to make a place for themselves around the stage and recording studio. Song and Gong's first collaboration anchors that story in a friendship formed through poverty, while the wider ensemble brings competing ambitions and unequal access to opportunity into the same world.

Key Points

• Tantara is scheduled to premiere worldwide on Netflix on December 11, 2026.
• Song Hye-kyo and Gong Yoo play childhood friends Min-ja and Dong-gu in their first project together.
• The drama follows people pursuing success in South Korea's entertainment industry from the 1960s through the 1980s.
• Kim Seol-hyun, Cha Seung-won, Lee Ha-nui and Na Moon-hee also star.
• Noh Hee-kyung writes the series, Lee Yoon-jung directs, and GTist, Studio Dragon and Imaginus produce.
• The production has a reported budget of 80 billion won and is listed with 22 episodes.