After a long time, a solo hero film like Cheeni Kum has done extremely well. Have audience tastes changed?
They have liked the film. We are happy that something different has been accepted, though there were apprehensions from the media that we had just done a film with a similar premise of an older man falling in love with a younger woman.
CK was lighter, more comic and in some ways it looked morally correct, as opposed to Nishabd, where the audience had a pre-conceived notion that it was morally incorrect. We will respect that as the film has not done well.
Did you feel disappointed?
It was very challenging for me to do the role. I was surprised that Ram Gopal Varma could make a film of this nature, particularly when he has been known to delve more into grittier subjects on the underworld or an action film. I was surprised that he could understand some emotions in the film. We didn't want to make a film that was deliberately saying this is amoral or immoral.
I thought the way Balki divided the screenplay and brought out the situations, it was like any other commercial, romantic film -- except he was 64 and she was 34, and the father was 58, which was a pretty ridiculous situation, but it went well. I am very happy.
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