Of Shadows and Second Leads
Kai Alfonso in Tips and Advices
Jun 07, 2020 • 3 min Read
Recently I watched a K-drama that tackled the beauty of second leads. In fairytales, we call them witches, the wicked, the villains, but we all know that without them — the shadows — our heroes will never shine. Second leads have their own stories to tell and their own reasons why they support or go against the protagonist. Their stories also deserve our attention.
As the line “and they lived happily ever after” appear, our second leads have learned their lessons, have come to a realization, step back to win, take the solitary road ahead, and probably have shed a bucket of tears as they find meaning and purpose in their lives.
Second leads do not experience fairytale endings.
When asked, artists say that they are happily playing the second lead as they stay in the limelight longer than the heroes and they can just be who they are in public, unlike the leads who have reputations to uphold. There is no room for errors and physical flaws for leads. It must suck big time for them.
Second leads are allowed to be what they are in public and we accept them as they are, but we do not tolerate their behavior and we hate them on the side. The drama though taught me to learn to embrace their personalities and weaknesses. They are also heroes.
We are all playing leads in our respective lives, and our brilliance and success moments are brought about by the involvement of second leads and shadows surrounding us. Somehow we know how hard it is to play the part of lead characters so there are times when we slide down to playing second leads because we want to simply hide with sincerity and acknowledge our shortcomings and mistakes. These mistakes make us more human, more down to earth.
We are all lead characters, but we can go from heroes to villains anytime we want to. We are responsible for shifting gears at the moment most convenient to us, but there are consequences. Should things go wrong, we cannot point fingers and pass the blame. We should be responsible for our actions.
If I were playing Cinderella right now, I should understand why my stepsisters would also want to have glass slippers. If I were Snow White, I should understand why the evil queen would be obsessed with Snow White being the fairest of them all. I guess my fairy godmother would not really mind if my stepsisters and I got the same benefits. Like Snow White, I would love to advice the evil queen that beauty is in the eye of the beholder. Definitely, the mirror had nothing to do with it.
Examining our lives will reveal to us all the characters that we have stepped into just to be who we are right now. Doing so will make us appreciate all the second leads who have been in our shadow so that we can play that coveted lead role.
May we all find the beauty waiting in the shadow.
