Vivek Oberoi, who plays the theatrical Âantagonist in Inside Edge, talks to Prachi Pinglay-Plumber about experimenting with the new platform of web series
How do you feel about playing an important role in one of the first productions of this scale on a digital platform in India? Â
Well바카라ŠI am doing emotional cartwheels right now! I바카라m extremely excited. Things have never been done on this scale before and people are taking to binge watching the 10 episodes in one shot. I was amazed that people have made groups for marathon watching. After doing 40-odd films in 15 years, I바카라m surprised at the reach of this platform. And the infrastructure is such that the platform is available for viewing in 196 countries globally! We have people watching the series in Italy and France when we would have thought: 바카라Who plays cricket in these countries?바카라 I was trending worldwide for five hours, which has not happened even with a big film. With this medium, I truly think the world is your oyster.
Did you worry about another negative role, a medium that is not exactly 바카라blockbuster바카라?
People tried to warn me against it. 바카라Kaam nahin hai kya,바카라 they would say, but I told them that this is the future and I want to be the first mainstream guy to jump in. It has been a great team with Excel. We have totally killed it man! I think it바카라s just a matter of time when the big guys jump on the ship. As far as my role goes, all I can say is, it바카라s good to be bad, sometimes.
And then there is this dark side of cricket?
It was a revelation when I started doing research on the story and my character. I mean, I바카라m a big cricket fan바카라Šone of the 바카라bleeding blue바카라 type, but I realised that not many people know about the dark side of the game바카라how spot fixing and match fixing actually work. I was very disturbed that all this can happen with the game. It바카라s all about artful deception, and it hurts knowing it is so.
How different are the ways of reaching out to the audience in this format from a typical cinema format?
For films, we reach about 2.5 crore of the population. But for a web series, with smart phone user numbers pegged at 38-40 crores there is a 20 times jump in the potential audience.
When you are distributing a film바카라say you made a small, cute film on a Rs 5-crore budget바카라it would cost at least Rs 10 crore. So, the distribution cost can easily be much more than the budget of the film. Even if I manage to put it in the screens, there will be the headache of how it바카라s doing on a morning show, evening show etc. But one can watch a web series whenever, wherever. It will also mitigate piracy in a big way. It is a great platform to watch what you want, make what you want, use your discretion at just Rs40-50 a month. Look at the basic numbers right now바카라Amazon Prime can be subscribed at Rs 499 per year. If it reaches 10 crore people, you are looking at about Rs 5,000 crore in India. This is a multi-billion dollar game. And no amount of content is wasted. In the current set up, a film producer gets maximum one or two weeks and just the opening weekend really. Here you can watch Inside Edge 20 years later too.
