Lee Yoo-mi of Squid Game becomes the first Korean artist to win a Creative Arts Emmy

Squid Game holds the record as Netflix’s most popular series of all time, with over 1.65 billion view hours in the first 28 days after its September 2021 premiere.

Lee Yoo-mi/Twitter

Lee Yoo-mi made history when she won the Creative Arts Emmy for outstanding guest actress in a drama series for her work on the popular survival drama series Squid Game making her the first Korean actor to do so.

In the superhit Korean language Netflix original, the actor played Ji-yeong, aka Player No 240, who decides to take the fall in the game of marbles so that her teammate Sae-byeok (Player No 067) can advance to the fifth and penultimate round of the lethal Squid Game.

According to Deadline, Lee was recognised for her role in the show's episode Gganbu which was written and directed by Hwang Dong-hyuk.

"Thank you so much for this huge honour. I want to give my thanks to the TV academy, especially a big thanks to my Netflix team as well," Lee said, via a translator, in her acceptance speech.

The actor, whose credits also include the Netflix zombie school drama All of Us Are Dead then added in English: "I'm so happy, thank you!"

Other nominees in this category were Marcia Gay Harden (The Morning Show) Martha Kelly (Euphoria), and Succession actors Hope Davis, Sanaa Lathan and Harriet Walter.

At the ceremony, which celebrated artistic and technical achievement on television, Squid Game scored in four other categories; special video effects, stunt performance and production design.

The sidebar event will be followed by the upcoming Primetime Emmy Awards, to be held on September 12, where Squid Game has received seven nominations, including for best drama, making it the first non-English show to be nominated in this category.

“Holding it now feels very heavy and it almost feels like a sense of heavy responsibility that I have as an actress. I want to be able to do more with it moving forward,” she said of her Emmy win.

Recalling the past, Lee Yoo-mi, in an interview, revealed that she had auditioned 500 times before hitting the jackpot with Squid Game and All of Us Are Dead.

“Squid Game took the world by storm with Director Hwang’s captivating story and iconic imagery. We’re grateful for his support as we turn the fictional world into reality in this massive competition and social experiment,” said Brandon Riegg, Netflix VP of Unscripted and Documentary Series.

Squid Game holds the record as Netflix’s most popular series of all time, with over 1.65 billion view hours in the first 28 days after its September 2021 premiere.

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