I have no fixed views on men, women and other issues: Vijay Deverakonda

MUMBAI: Actor Vijay Deverakonda is loving the overwhelming response to his new release "Geetha Govindam", which is a take on love and courtship.

Excerpts from the interview:

Q. What has the response been so far? Has the audience understood your impatience with conventional treatment of love and courtship?

A. Response is shocking. I can't even begin to assess what it is that's happening. My phone's ringing off the hook. Everyone is trying to understand what is happening. It's crazy! I am not even attempting to understand the response to "Geetha Govindam".

Q. The film deals with the dynamics of courtship in a healthy manner. How much of your own views are projected in the film?

A. I am figuring out my personal views. And evolving as a person every day. I have no fixed views on men, women and other issues. How I feel about various things is constantly changing, evolving. Breaking moulds wasn't on our minds. It's only a happy by-product.

Q. In the film, the heroine is shown to take advantage of your vulnerable situation. Normally it is men who are shown to be exploitative?

A. More than exploiting, I feel she has this pent-up anger and frustration at the sight of him. She is gracious enough to give him the benefit of the doubt and say he was not the one who harassed her when asked by her brother at their first meeting, seeing the trauma it would put his family through.

But that in no way meant she forgives him, and they are forced due to situations to spend so much time together. So then she gives him a tough time. I don't blame her though.

Q. But so many times men get wrongly accused of sexual harassment?

A. That is an extremely scary and discomforting thought. But in "Geetha Govindam", even though unintended, he shouldn't have gotten himself into that position. He could have avoided getting so friendly with a girl he had just met.

Q. Are you consciously breaking conventional moulds through your roles and films?

A. It's more unconscious. I am just drawn to this stuff more.

Q. Though clean and wholesome, the film is not shy about the gender equations. Do you think it's time Telugu cinema explored the man-woman equation beyond the surface level?

A. Cinema everywhere is growing up. We are no exception. I am glad "Geetha Govindam" has found an audience. If it hadn't, I'd still not embrace the conventional. That's not me.