I don’t think I am friends with any girl who doesn’t love Ranveer Singh. I mean, who doesn’t love that man anyway?! He’s a great actor, a director’s delight, a favourite amongst the industry peeps as well as the audience and even the media and the fashion police love him (which is rare!). Plus, we all know he’s a super son to his parents, a caring brother to his sister and a doting boyfriend to his bae, Deepika Padukone. Basically, he’s all of our dream men rolled into one.
But you know what’s the coolest thing about him? – He’s always real. That’s exactly why it’s so easy for the masses to connect with him. He dances on the streets and in the theatre while watching movies. He obliges his fans by striking fun poses with them for selfies. And he also endorses a condom brand – something that a very few stars would ever consider doing. Plus, the actor never shies away from talking unabashedly about tricky sex-related topics during his interviews.
It’s Tuesday and it’s #throwback time! So here are excerpts from an old interview (with Deccan Chronicle) of Mr. Singh where he’s spoken about sex and taking the risk of endorsing a condom brand.
I think I was around 12 when I did it. I started everything early, everything! I was way ahead — so much so, that in school all the mothers used to say he (Ranveer) is that rotten apple that’s spoiling all our kids. I used to hold sermons with all the boys surrounding me and I used to teach them. They hadn’t heard of it and I became the expert because I had started very early.
When I am in a car, I see these hoardings go by. I thought to myself, somebody is selling this, somebody is selling that, why isn’t anybody selling condoms? Then I realised that the only ads we have for condoms are very provocative in nature. That shouldn’t be the only prevailing definition of sex. As a society, we have evolved; our attitude towards the subject has changed. So we can have open and healthy conversations about this. Somebody needs to point that out or else people will keep treating it as taboo.
Not many mainstream actors have associated themselves with condom ads and Ranveer felt this was what was needed. “I had this idea and I called my people and asked them to contact Durex. I knew it was a huge risk. I thought I am either going to get two thumbs up or a tight slap. But it became a hit.You’ve always been a hit machine, Ranveer!