Korea's top entertainment agencies will not participate in an upcoming star search program.
A new Mnet television series, "Produce 101" aims to produce a new girl group from trainees already signed to Korean entertainment labels. However, it was reported by Korean news outlets over the weekend that neither SM Entertainment nor YG Entertainment's trainees will be part of the 101 women participating for their place in a K-pop group.
101 trainees will compete to fill 10 spots in an upcoming project group.
Both YG Entertainment and SM Entertainment have several female trainees who have already been previously introduced to the public, but none will appear on "Produce 101."
Mnet has produced other survival competition shows, including the popular hip hop based shows "Show Me The Money" and "Unpretty Rapstar."
The 101 trainees have already begun filming, reported entertainment insiders, but little else is known about the format of the show, except that the final project group will only include 10 members.
"Produce 101" will begin airing in January, pushing back the original December premiere date due to the amount of scheduling involved to include 101 trainees from multiple Korean music programs.
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Tamar Herman is a multi-media journalist and the co-founder of KultScene. She is a freelance writer and copy editor, and has written for MTV Iggy, Noisey, and Paste Magazine.
