Arjun Reddy star Vijay Deverakonda is back with his new Telugu film Taxiwala, his first post-Arjun Reddy, which will see the fiercely dedicated actor doing what he likes best: slipping into a character that is alien to the actor and far removed from his own personality as possible.
“We’re looking at a July release. The film requires a great deal of post-production work. It’a got a whole lot of computer-graphics and special-effects. And we don’t want to rush,” says Vijay.
Vijay enjoys working with new directors. “They are more open to new ideas. So the whole process of creating a film becomes more inclusive and participative. I was almost a unit-hand with Sandeep Vanga, my director of Arjun Reddy. Now it’s the same with Rahul Sankrityayan the director of Taxiwala.We are trying to create something worth the audiences’ time and money.”
Hungering for new challenges, Vijay has now chosen a role diametrically opposite to Arjun Reddy.
“In Taxiwala, I am not Arjun Reddy. In fact the two characters are so different that if they were to meet, they’d hate each other. For me as an actor, it was important not to do more of Arjun Reddy just because the audiences liked what they saw,” says the clear-headed sensible actor, who represents a movement towards changing the status quo in Telugu cinema.
For those of us who feel Telugu star-actor Vijay Deverakonda owns the role of Arjun Reddy, the fact that the Tamil version of the film would star Tamil actor Vikram’s son Dhruv while the Hindi version is to star Shahid Kapoor raises apprehensions.
Ask the original Arjun Reddy if he cares, and Vijay Deverakonda replies, “It’s the director’s call. Sandeep Vanga is a dear friend of mine. Recently when I won my first best actor for Arjun Reddy, my thank you speech was given by my director Sandeep. I handed over my award to him to keep in his bedroom. It would remind him of what he created and whom he discovered simply by writing the script that he did.”
Vijay says revisiting the character is not a priority for him.
“I think I did what I had to do with Arjun. Going back to his complex problems would be really painful for me. Painful and repetitive. I’d rather move on to playing other characters and see how Arjun is interpreted by other actors in different languages.”
Not that Vijay is shy of doing a Hindi film. “I will do one when I get to do something interesting. There is brilliant work happening in every Indian language. I’ve explored Tamil and Telugu. Let’s see what fate has in store for me next.”