Heechul's Profile

Kim Hee-chul (born July 10, 1983), sometimes mononymously credited as Heechul, is a Korean pop singer, actor, presenter, disc jockey and a member of the popular 13-member boy band Super Junior.

Pre-Super Junior

He was discovered at Starlight Casting System October 2002 where he joined the auditions on a whim with his friends. Even though he was late because of unfamiliar places, he still passed the audition because of his dance. Initially, Heechul was placed in a four-member project group called, "Four Seasons." This group included other members Jaejoong, Yunho, and Kangin. The prospective group never came through though as both Jaejoong and Yunho were chosen to join another all-male singing group, TVXQ, which debuted in December 2003. With two members gone, the idea of Four Seasons dropped. Heechul and Kangin were then placed in Super Junior along with ten other trainees under the same company. This project group managed through well and debuted two years later on November 6, 2005 under the name Super Junior 05, the first generation of Super Junior. The initial plan for this group is that members would be continuously cycled in and then fazed out into other projects.
Other activities of Heechul before his official debut include modeling, acting, and VJing. He made his first appearance on TV starring in the teen drama “Banolim 2”.

Official Debut: Super Junior

On November 6, 2005, Kim Heechul officially debuted as part of Super Junior 05 on SBS “Inkingayo,” performing the group's first single “TWINS (Knock Out)”. The group was supposed to comprise the first generation of Super Junior. In early 2006, SM Entertainment was beginning to recruit new members for the next Super Junior generation, Super Junior 06, where Heechul would still be an undergraduate member. However, plans changed. The company decided to add a thirteenth member, Kyuhyun, and declared a halt in forming future Super Junior generations. The group dropped the suffix “05″ and became officially credited as Super Junior.
The re-polished group hit it big after it released the first CD single “U” the following summer in 2006. "U" became Super Junior’s most successful single in the music charts until the release of “Sorry, Sorry” in March 2009. However, setbacks occurred for the promotions of “U” in the later half of the year when Heechul suffered a major injury from a car accident that occurred on August 10, 2006.

Car Accident

On August 10, 2006, Heechul was involved in a car accident while heading back to Seoul from Mokpo after attending the funeral of fellow Super Junior member Donghae’s father. The tires malfunctioned while his car attempted to switch lanes. Heechul fractured his left leg in five places, including his femur, knee, and ankle, requiring him to be in surgery for six hours. He also sustained other injuries, including a tear in his tongue which required stitches.
Heechul was advised to stop all activities for a period of twelve weeks. He was released from the hospital on September 13, 2006 but he continued to receive out-patient care. He returned to the hospital to have a second surgery to remove some of the iron rods in his leg on October 10 and briefly returned to work in late October to film the final three episodes of an MBC youth sitcom while still in a cast and on a wheelchair. He made his comeback on November 25 of the same year during the Mnet KM Music Festival (MKMF) Awards but it was only in late December that Heechul officially returned to individual activities such as variety show appearances and hosting appearances.
In 2007, Heechul started to perform regularly despite still having a few rods that the doctors had attached to his leg. In late April and May 2007, he had recovered enough to be able to take part in Super Junior's strenuous dance routines. The remaining rods in his leg were removed in 2008.

Super Junior-T

Heechul became part of a Super Junior sub-group, Super Junior-T, which debuted on February 23, 2007 with the Trot “teuroteu” single “Rokuko!!!” (65 로꾸거; [RoKuGo (backwards) spelled backwards]).

2007 to Present

In 2007, Heechul participated in Super Junior's second album Don't Don, the band's “Super Show” tour, and filmed Super Junior's first movie “Attack on the Pin-Up Boys”.
In 2008, he was active in Super Junior's activities: the visit to Japan, their second photobook “Boys at City Season 2″ (shot in Tokyo) and the “Super Show Encore” concert.
In 2009, Super Junior released their third album Sorry, Sorry, which was released on March 13. Their title song "Sorry Sorry" was immensely popular and claimed #1 positions on all major charts. After the first week of sales, the album topped the Hanteo Chart, with 30,000 copies sold just on its first day of release. As well as this, the song achieved its first #1 on KBS's Music Bank on March 27 - only two weeks after their comeback stage. The song continued to prove it's popularity, winning a total of 5 #1's on Music Bank and a triple crown on SBS's Inkigayo.
The group then released a follow up repackage of their third album called It's You, which was released on May 11. The comeback performance was made on May 17 on SBS's Inkigayo, and on the following week made performances on KBS's Music Bank, where they won their first K-Chart for the song on May 22. The promotions for the song was cut short due to the group's second live concert tour.
On May 13, 2010, Super Junior released their fourth album Bonamana and made a comeback stage on KBS Music Bank on the 14th. The album once again proved the group's popularity, selling over 36,000 copies on its first day of release - more than that of their third album.
On June 28, 2010, Super Junior released their repackaged album with three new tracks - "No Other", "All My Heart", "A Short Journey" - and the remixed version of "Shake It Up!".

Television and Acting career

Like bandmate Kibum, Heechul made his first television appearance as an actor before the debut of Super Junior. He starred in the 2005 teen drama, Sharp 2, in which he acted alongside Kibum. Not long afterwards, Heechul appeared in an episode of Loveholic as a chef trainee. After the debut of Super Junior, Heechul teamed with Kibum again to star in the sixth season of Nonstop, alternatively known as Rainbow Romance. In 2006, Heechul starred as the supporting character Gong Min in Bad Family. In 2007, he starred in the popular family drama Golden Bride as Kim Young-soo.
Heechul began to appear on numerous variety shows such as Vitamin, Sponge, Xman and Love Letter. Kim Heechul can also be seen in advertisements for various Korean brands.
From September 9 to November 9, 2008, Heechul and Kangin starred in the Korean version of the musical Xanadu, sharing the lead role Sonny. Auditions and casting picks were done via a reality television (To Be Kangin and Heechul), which also served to promote the musical.


Heechul was also on a TV show called Joahseo or Good Daddy, where he and three other celebrities, including Lee HongKi from FT Island, learned to be good fathers by caring for a "daughter". After Good Daddy show, he become close friend with Lee HongKi and their close relationship enable them to be chosen in Save Energy Campaign in the middle of 2009. Heechul was also in “Band of Brothers” with Super Junior's Kangin, and Jungmo and Jay from “The TRAX”. In the show, the band paid tribute to famous and different groups during their showcase at the end of the program.

Hosting stints

Heechul began hosting before his music debut. He was a regular MC for the cable music show Show! Music Tank. He was also a substitute MC for Andy of Shinhwa on SBS “Inki Gayo” on numerous occasions. Heechul also became a permanent host for SBS “Inki Gayo” with Korean actor Jang Geun Suk on February 25, 2007.
He hosted his own radio show, SBS Power FM Youngstreet along with Park Heebon, but the program ended in mid-2006. After the 55-episode drama "Loving You Ten Million Times" ended in early 2010, he returned to SBS radio as a DJ to host his own radio program, "HeeChul's Young Street." The show, which started airing on 29 March 2010, is broadcast by Power FM 107.7 MHz from 8:00 to 10:00 pm (Korea Time). The program is his first comeback as a DJ in four years.
In May 2010, he was announced as a regular cast member on Family Outing 2. The show ended two months later due to low ratings.

Internet

Heechul is well-known to fans as a netizen due to the large amount of time he spends on the internet. He was even called out on the fact by fellow group member Eunhyuk on the 17/09/09 episode of SBS Intimate Note, who jokingly asked him whether his occupation was a netizen or a music artist, because he spent more time managing his webpage than actually singing.
Most recently, Heechul has been very active on Twitter. On October 9, he created a personal Facebook, which collected 5,000 friend requests within 5 minutes. He was also a worldwide trending topic on Twitter for four days (from 9 Oct 2010 to 12 Oct 2010).