#PLS HYPE HER SO I CAN GET A SEASON 2 WITH COMMANDER YAI. PLEASE BL TUMBLR. DO SOMETHING.

[clairedaring]

Bright and Nonkul's insane preparation for I Feel You Linger In The Air - An Appreciation Post

Yesterday, Bright and Nonkul went on World of Y Podcast to promote the series and my dear friend Salt on Twitter (huge thank you and shoutout to her) has kindly provided brief translations for their Podcast episode. I'm compiling some of the most interesting tidbits from this Podcast to once again appreciate the efforts and dedication both actors have for their respective roles.

1. Bright's journey to being casted as Khun Yai

For Bright, he was actually contacted by Director P'Tee and Producer P'Boss numerous times (for other projects) but at those times, the timing just didn't work out well for Bright.

For IFYLITA, P'Tee contacted Bright's manager, P'Pear who asked Bright if he wanted to act in this. Bright asked for some time to do his homework and he asked his friends who are into BL novels and series to help him check IFYLITA out. And after 2-3 days, his friend got back to him to tell him that it's actually really good. Bright didn't say that he was gonna play Yai but he just said that he might act in this series. But his friend asked him if Bright would be playing Yai because when they read it, they felt that Bright could really be Yai.

So Bright went on Youtube to watch the spoiler-ish book review videos. He saw that IFYLITA was actually super interesting and so he went to purchase the novel to read, before accepting the role. (Bright spoke about this story before)

2. Nonkul on the challenges of portraying Jom and how he has prepared for the series

Nonkul says one of the challenges he face was how to portray Jom's femininity without being too much. Nonkul said he was used to playing more masculine roles and so, this was a heavier part of his homework. And he already knew that this storyline was a challenge in itself but the series still makes him making me want to act in it -- time travel, period drama.

It was Nonkul's experience and training as an experienced actor that helped him find the sweet spot when it came to expressing Jom's femininity

In reference to Jom's femininity, Nonkul used the women in his life as references (his sisters, diff actresses). He also had a male senior who's LGBT+ whom he observed and adapted for Jom's role.

Nonkul sees being actor as being an athlete but in terms of expressing personality, setting the mood and speaking. They need to train their bodies to be able to do these things without getting tired as an athlete does in their sport. As they are more familiar with their bodies, they can observe and adjust the way they act accordingly. It's similar to dancers who've trained all their lives being able to replicate a dance upon seeing it once.

The MC remarked that in the novel, we can see Jom's thoughts and feelings very obviously whereas in the series, Jom isn't as communicative about his thoughts and feelings

Nonkul says that we need to remember that in the novel, we can see all of Jom's thoughts and feelings really clearly vs the series. In series, it's impossible for Jom to be stating his feelings out in black and white like that. So there's a need to design the character in such a way that they could get the archetype of Jom across as efficiently as possible. While Jom in the novel and series may not be exactly the same, Nonkul feels that the series still captures the essence of Jom pretty well.

Nonkul also felt like he had to lose some weight to fit the idea of Jom in his head. He lost about 3kg but he had intended for about 5-6kg. He couldn't do it as he was filming 4 other series at that time. Nonkul couldn't lose too much weight because for 2 of his other series that was filming at the same time, he needed to be more masculine and muscular (Remember and The Office Games iirc). So it wasn't possible to lose that much weight. Nonkul needed to be fair not to affect his other work but also try to look as close as novel Jom's visuals. Nonkul lost weight by eating only one meal a day and not eating that much.

3. On Bright and Nonkul's hectic schedule in between filming of IFYLITA

The filming duration was long because Nonkul was filming 4 series concurrently and Bright was filming 3 concurrently and there were scheduling issues. But this also allowed them to spend more time with each other and make his speech more natural too. Bright says that the problems that they encountered was really nothing to do with acting but more about logistics like clashing schedules, equipment...

Bright and Nonkul also spoke a lot about being very in sync when working together (helping each other with camera blocking, tacit shared understanding/vision for scenes together,...)

4. On Bright's preparation for the role of Khun Yai

Bright says that he's usually a person who speaks really fast so to become Khun Yai, he made an effort to slow down his speech in daily life. Bright also said he made an effort to pronounce his 'r' sounds more clearly. (T/N: You will notice many Thai people today don't pronounce 'r' sounds or they just replace it with 'l' sounds (B does the latter often in his natural speech)

The way tones are executed in Thai today and in the past is slightly different. So when Bright watched the pilot they shot, he realised that he needed to make some changes to his speech as Yai who is someone who appears very sweet when he talks.

Bright attended a workshop to help with his speech because he was speaking too fast and unclearly. He would also do mouth exercises (a,e,i,o,u etc) while driving. Bright used "olden" language in his daily life to make his speech so convincing in the series. For instance, when he played games with his friends and they were streaming, he'd speak with olden language to practice (see: clip of Bright using "olden" language while playing ROV in this gaming livestream with his friend).

This "olden" way of speaking still sticks with Bright up till today and he sometimes still speaks using some of the olden terms like using chan to refer to himself. Bright thought it was important for him to work on his speech because it would be really obvious if he spoke like today's generation and it would be too similar to the way Jom speaks.

5. On self-rating their portrayals of Jom and Khun Yai in the series

Nonkul gives himself a 7-8/10 for his acting in this series as Jom. He feels that there isn't any way to be a perfect 10, there's always things to improve upon. There's also some scenes which he feels that he could've acted better in.

Bright gives himself a 6-7-8/10 for his performance in this series. He feels that him doing his own homework needs to be coupled with the brief from the directors etc. And he also feels that it'll never be a case of his performance ever being fully perfect too.

With the amount of "homework" they've done for this series, I'm still constantly astounded by the dedication and hardwork both Bright and Nonkul put into crafting their respective characters, Khun Yai and Jom. I really wish both Nonkul and Bright (especially Bright as IFYLITA is Bright's first ever male lead role) in their future projects because one can truly see how passionate and ambitious both actors are from their preparation of the roles.

For my post on Nonkul and Bright's experience in queer media prior to IFYLITA