Vivek Oberoi: I was offered to contest the 2014 elections by many parties

Vivek Oberoi, who was in Lucknow on Friday, is slated to play the role of dreaded UP don Virendra Pratap Shahi
‘I had been shopping for this kind of a role’ While the internet has been abuzz with the news of actor Vivek Oberoi playing the role of Virendra Pratap Shahi, the dreaded mafia don from Gorakhpur who was gunned down in Lucknow in 1997, the actor dodges the question.“I’ve heard he was quite an iconic character and I enjoy playing iconic characters. Biopics are very interesting,” he says, adding, “I want to come here and spend time researching the character.” But Vivek isn’t new to Lucknow, with friends in the city. He’s also shot parts of Omkara and Zilla Ghaziabad here, and would love to come back to shoot a film here. “Lucknow ka culture bahot zabardast hai. Yahan pe main zaroor shooting karna chaahta hoon. In fact, the whole of UP is so interesting. Yahan ka jo kirdaar hai, typically Lakhnawi, aur woh jo Kanpuriya andaaz hai na, woh bahot colourful hai. Though Lucknow-Kanpur are so close by, yet both the cities are so different. If you go to Varanasi, which I visited recently, it has a beautifully preserved cultural heritage, the roots of that place are incredible. So I want to definitely play someone from this place. Which is why this question you asked me earlier (about playing Virendra Pratap Shahi onscreen) – I had, in fact, been considering playing such a character from here and was shopping for this kind of a role. I had been asking people to bring me something from UP, ki mujhe UP ka character la ke do,” says the actor with a mysterious smile.
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‘I have become superstitious now'
While Vivek insists there’s a lot happening the next year, he is reluctant to disclose his future plans. “There’s a lot of things being planned for the web, there’s a lot of collaborations that are going on. But I guess when they are a reality, the day they take off, will be the right time to talk about them. I have become quite superstitious now and I’ve kind of made a rule that I will not talk about it till it comes to fruition and there’s something concrete on papers,” he explains. So, even when you ask him about the details of the sequel to Company, he just says, “It’s of course a dream. It is one of my favourite characters and there’s a certain amount of work on the script and stuff still to be done. But like I said, unless something’s on the floor, it’s not real. I have a whole lot of dreams but between converting them to reality, you have to cross a lot of bridges. So, it’s a dream and hopefully it will come true.”
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‘Feel responsibe as an artiste’ Known mostly for the grey characters that he has played like Chandu Nagre in Company or Maya Dolas in Shootout At Lokhandwala or even as Meet Mehta in the Masti series, an adult comedy, Vivek says that he does feel a sense of responsibility towards affecting the youth in a negative way but he wouldn’t entirely take it upon himself. “I went through a very interesting crisis at one point of time. A fan of mine would act like Maya Dolas and he was just 15-16 years old. He would walk like that, talk like that and even dress up like that. But one day he took things too far and was caught with a weapon,” shares Vivek. Vivek adds, “He was intimidating a few people with it. I got to know this through the newspapers and contacted the police. When they found him for me, I explained to him that what he saw on screen was not the real me, it was just a character I play, and not to be confused with reality. He did serve time eventually but I think I did get through to him somewhat. So yes, one does feel responsible as an artiste but then you can’t be creatively free if you take all the responsibility. Then you start to constrict yourself, which is not right. Like when I was playing Kaal in Krissh 3, I used to wonder if kids will watch this film, what will they think of me. But kids surprised me. Instead of hating me or being scared of me, they loved me and identified with me as a comic book character. They could differentiate that this is not reality.” He also says, “As a social worker, I have a parallel identity too. So I guess that kind of discounts what I play on screen.”
‘I wouldn’t want watch Masti with my family’ But would he be embarrassed about his son watching the Masti series of films when he grows up? “I’m embarrassed now! Yes, I think so,” he replies, going on to add, “When I was in Delhi for the release of Grand Masti and there was a programme I had to attend to at one of the multiplexes for an afternoon show. When I was walking in, they told me, it was packed. And I was like how will I go and face this crowd, specially the ladies? I was very worried ki ladies kaise react karengi because we were entering mid-way in the film. But it was incredible – there was this group of ladies and they told me that they had asked their husbands to watch the film separately. So, I guess it’s about who you watch such a film with. So, when my son grows up and watches the film, he would know my whole body of work and he would understand what humour is. I think 15-16 years down the line, I would be able to back-slap him and make fun of it together. But if you ask me if I want to watch it with my family – NO.”
‘I have had the Govt's support'
Acting aside, Vivek’s political affiliations and his presence at Narendra Modi’s swearing-in ceremony as PM suggest a career in politics ahead. “As a matter of fact I was offered to contest the 2014 Elections by multiple parties, parties with conflicting ideologies, but I said no. I made a very conscious decision that I wanted to continue doing what I wanted to through my social work. I have had the government’s support, across spectrums, for it, so let me concentrate my energies there,” he retorts. However, the actor accepts that he is a big fan of PM Modi. “As far as criticism goes, every man who’s been a prime minster has come in for criticism. Whether it was Jawaharlal Nehru sahab, or Indira Gandhi – everyone’s been crticised at one point of time. Just the volume or the decibel level makes it louder now. Now, it seems more, because of social media and the 24-hour access to news. Pehle kahan thay yeh sab 24 hours waale news channels! Ab toh we have our phones with us through which we have access to what’s happening around the world in seconds,” he adds.
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