The year he turned 20, he debuted in the play A Streetcar Named Desire. He had started acting in a university theater club. In 1992, he says, he stopped wanting to act, left the stage and ran a cafe.
He started doing theater again in 1999. In 2001, he made his screen debut in a bit part in the film Kiss Me Much. In 2004, he played Detective Lee in director Choi Dong-hoon’s debut, The Big Swindle. The next year, he appeared in the dramas Resurrection and Thank You, My Life.
The breakthrough yearIn 2006, the year he turned 38, MBC’s morning drama Love Me When You Can and the films Like a Virgin and Tazza followed one another. Newsen writes that the role that made Kim Yoon-seok’s name widely known was Agwi in Tazza.
In 2007, he won Best Supporting Actor at the Grand Bell Awards for Tazza and appeared in The Happy Life. In 2008, his first lead role, The Chaser, was released, and he won Best Actor at the Grand Bell Awards, the Blue Dragon Film Awards and the Korean Film Awards that year. In 2009, Running Turtle and Jeon Woo-chi: The Taoist Wizard were released.
In 2010, The Yellow Sea, his second film with director Na Hong-jin, was released. In 2011, he played the teacher Dong-ju in Punch. In 2012, The Thieves passed 10 million viewers. In 2013, Hwayi: A Monster Boy was released.
In 2014, he appeared in Sea Fog. In 2015, he played the detective Gong Gil-yong in The Classified File and a priest in The Priests, one after the other. In 2016, Will You Be There? was released. In 2017, he played Kim Sang-heon in The Fortress and Park Cheo-won in 1987, one after the other.
In 2018, he won the Baeksang Arts Awards Best Actor in film and the Blue Dragon Film Awards Best Actor for 1987, and Dark Figure of Crime was released. In 2019, he made his directorial debut with Another Child. In 2021, he played Ambassador Han Sin-seong in Escape from Mogadishu. In 2022, he received a Presidential Commendation at the Korean Popular Culture and Arts Awards.
In 2023, he played Yi Sun-sin in Noryang: Deadly Sea. In 2024, he returned to drama in Netflix’s The Frog, and About Family was released. In 2025, Virus was released and he signed with HB Entertainment. In 2026, he was cast in tvN’s My Ghostly Running Mate.
Kim Yoon-seok (born Jan 21, 1968) debuted in the play A Streetcar Named Desire in 1988, the year he turned 20, and became known as Agwi in the film Tazza, released on Sep 28, 2006, the year he turned 38. He won his first Best Actor award in 2008, the year he turned 40.
Ages are by calendar year (the year minus the birth year), birthdays aside.