Today, we have to fight to be relevant to the audience: Dinesh Vijan

We have seen filmmakers create a whole universe with action, cops, comedy and even superheroes.

- Madhureeta Mukherjee

But in our cinema and in today’s times, creating a horror comedy universe is rare, and let’s say, not a job for the weakhearted. There in comes Dinesh Vijan, who leads Maddock Films, a place which he says, ‘Is a home for anyone who wants to tell a story, no matter where you come from’. After Stree and Roohi, he’s all set to release Bhediya in theatres on November 25 – a creature comedy starring Varun Dhawan and Kriti Sanon, directed by Amar Kaushik that is also backed by Jio Studios. Dinesh passionately talks to us about what drives him, how we need to unearth great stories from within us, and what made him pave new roads, and sometimes take the forests less travelled.

It’s hard enough to land a good comedy with the audience, and blending it with horror and thrill, and also building a universe around it with a string of movies, is tricky. What pushed you in this direction? Honestly, I have never looked at any film that I have made as a risk. When I made Hindi Medium, some people told me it was a risk, and before that, it was Badlapur. When you hear a concept from a director or writer, your first thought has to be, ‘I can’t not make this film’, and that’s what drives me to make it. Instinct is everything for me. If there is a voice from inside that tells me that I should make a film, I do it. After being in the business for 18 years, our strength is that we don’t take ourselves seriously. We don’t think we know it all.