Ronit Roy's 'Interview'

Ronit Roy on Itna Karo Na Mujhe Pyaar: Ekta Kapoor has her own viewpoint, so I don't try to add an extra vision to it

The actor speaks at length about his upcoming show Deal Or No DeaL, daily soap Itna Karo Na Mujhe Pyaar and much more. Read on!

Five years after he hosted a culinary show Kitchen Champion, Ronit Roy is back as an anchor. He will be hosting the game show Deal Or No Deal on &TV. While his last reality show had TV stars as contestants, this one will have him interacting with the laymen. And that, says Ronit, is the most exciting aspect of the show. Known as the Amitabh Bachchan of TV, Ronit has been successfully juggling films and shows for the last few years. Here he talks about returning as a host and why he thinks it will do well...

Deal Or No Deal was hosted by Rajeev Khandelwal, Mandira Bedi and R Madhavan earlier and it did not do that well. What prompted you to take up this show?

You know me " I am not the kind who takes up projects, films or TV, with the thought of commercial success. Besides, internationally the show is a big hit and even its South Indian adaptations have done well.It's been running for two years in the South. I played the game myself and found it very exciting. Most importantly, I am an optimist, I don't see any reason why it should not do well.

What did you find exciting about the show?I watched a few international episodes and from what I saw the hosts did a fabulous job. But yes, I didn't find a connect between the contestants. That's because they have 26 models participating in the show. Here, however, we will have family members and communities and that makes all the difference. In joint families you have members discussing every issue. Also, you find colourful characters in every family " somebody may sing well, another might dance and yet another could be a poet. So, apart from the money aspect " winner gets a prize money of '1 crore " this show will give a freedom of expression to all the contestants. We will see what real families are like. We will even have communities, like dabbawallahs and a girl's football team on the show.

So far, which has been an exciting episode for you?

Every episode is exciting and tiring " I shoot continously for three hours for an episode without a break. What is exciting is I get to meet new people on the show. In fact, that was one of the main reasons I took up the show. In my serial Adalat, I used to act with new actors in every episode, I liked the idea of meeting new people in every episode of the show. The one with the dabbawallahs was great fun. They all are like brothers " a family " they came playing dhol-nagada. A few days before they shot for the episode, somebody had died and they wanted to win the money for the children of the deceased. The one-hour episode was an unique experience. I learnt some amazing things like out of six lakh deliveries in a day, there would be only one error! And that Prince Charles who wanted to meet them when he had come to India had to schedule the time according to the dabbawallahs! They gifted me a dabba at the end of the episode and I feel proud that after Prince Charles, they gave a dabba to me.

Your last release Guddu Rangeela didn't do well. How do you go about choosing your roles?

I don't know why Guddu Rangeela failed, but I don't have any fixed 10 questions that will guide me in choosing a role. I pretty much go with storyteller rather than script. I have seen instances of how a bad maker can screw a good script. Sometimes even if a script doesn't look good on paper " especially a thriller " it shapes out very well and that's because of the maker.

Your other TV show Itna Karo Na Mujhe Pyaar has been going on for a while? Doesn't fatigue set in?

It's a daily show and things keep changing, new elements come in and that's what keeps me going. If not, one tends to get mechanical. Also, unlike a game show, which I will be handling on my own, in a daily soap there are several characters and they have their own viewpoint. Ekta Kapoor who is producing the show has her own viewpoint, so I don't try to add an extra vision to it. I just do whatever I am told to the best of my capacity and keep the actors inspired.

What next?

I have a few films "will start shooting for one in October " and TV shows lined up, but it's too early to talk about them.