Abhay Deol

We all have to find a cause we believe in and pursue it. Sometimes it may cost you your job, your personal life, your love life, etc.

I have always been up for risks, but only because I had full confidence and faith in the vision of my directors.

People don't think of genres anymore. The script is all that matters. And as long as it appeals to my sensibilities as an actor-producer, I'm on.

I don't even know if I'd get married. Time will tell.

I have cheated. But I don't regret it because we were not serious. I wouldn't have ever done it if I were serious about the girl.

As a teenager, I used to dress up like a hippie. My clothes weren't posh.

I am over that phase where any kind of story would bother me, be it personal or professional. I just laugh it off and forget about it.

I want to do different roles and not get stuck in a rut and 'Shanghai' will be one film I'm absolutely looking forward to.

I read about myself in the papers all the time.

N.Y. is like second home to me. I love that city. I have lived there for a couple of years and it's always a pleasure to go back there.

The Deol family is very close knit and emotional.

The kind of work I do and the films I believe in, I had to take charge of making that kind of cinema.

After being an actor, producing 'One By Two' was a natural progression.

I am not anti-marriage.

I'd rather point a finger at myself than others.

A decade down the line, I don't want to sit back and think that I didn't do anything to stop disasters like the extinction of certain species.

At my parents house, there are three dogs. I've grown up with these four-legged creatures all my life.

With my humor, I end up offending everybody!

It was really good working with Paresh Rawal. I was nervous at first because he is such a big star and I love his performances, but the initial nervousness went away once I got to know him. He is a very simple and hardworking man.

My cousins and my uncle have been iconic heroes in the industry and I don't think I'm anywhere close to that, but I'm happy that they like my work. They are my elders and it's natural for me to look up to them.

I really want to do a film with my uncle and my cousins. I'm sure it will be really interesting to work with them.

'Basra' is high on content, but a good dose of action sequences will make it edgy and pretty dark as well.

I realized that I need to protect my films because the director will move on, the producer will move on too, but as an actor I will be considered a flop if things will not work.

The thing about action films is that they are high on drama in terms of action sequences, have songs and other things, but content is secondary.

If we are not affected by our environment, then we have somewhere become insensitive. It might be good in a way because you might not be affected by anything and be calm always.

It is definitely hard when you're going against the tide. Of course, it is tough. But does that mean you can't do it? No, it depends on your strength, stamina and ability to take so much power against you.

If I did an item song, it would be something to watch out for.

Acting is more creative and liberating than production.

I agree that at the end of the day, it's a man's world, but when I'm doing a film, I am working with the director, not a man or a woman.

'One by Two' is a film about two people who live in the same city and do certain things that affect each other's lives. Yet, they are strangers. It's difficult to put the film in any particular genre or box.

Being a Deol for me is to be honest; walking with my head held high and never having to bow in front of injustice.

Beat up 10 guys, win the girl, and yet you are supposed to be a normal human being. I don't mind doing that as a superhero but not as a real person!

I am most attracted to characters and stories that I can relate to. The traditional formula of 'larger than life' I never found attractive.

I choose my films carefully. I have done movies that are sensitive, which deal with some issue and are a mirror of society.

I am not a politician nor an activist but in my small way try and bring change with the kind of films I do.

I would never enter politics, but I will go out and vote.

It's not that I don't want to do different films. The non-mainstream stuff that I did started to get successful... But for an industry which runs essentially on money, they do put you in a box.

It would be great to read a script, which is an action script uniquely written so that it doesn't cost an arm or a leg because we are now accustomed to seeing action in the superhero form.

It is not a happy time when a film doesn't do well... Everything affects you, success affects you and failure also affects you.

We have 5000-year-old history which is now almost a part of our DNA. How do you break that? America, for example, doesn't have that history behind it. It romanticizes rebellion. We look down upon rebellion. It's an insult. To think out-of-the-box is looked down upon here.

Lot of people liked me in 'Manorama Six feet Under,' 'Oye Lucky Lucky Oye,' 'Dev D' and 'Shanghai' and the only common thing in all these films is that when we were making them we never thought they would work. The ones that did not work were safe films.

When there is stuff being written about your family and people ask you questions which are very personal in nature, it makes you defensive and almost makes you angry.

I was inherently slightly more bitter or cynical and that kept me from going to the commercial formulaic crowd. Also, I went to an art college and I did my foundation in art.

I grew a very early distaste for fame and glamour because I saw what the spotlight and attention can do to you as a family, so to speak.

It's scary to work with family, alongside my brothers and uncle. I can't imagine myself screaming at them even in front of the camera.

Fortunately, I got critic and audience acceptance much earlier than industry acceptance.

I enjoy films like 'American Beauty' and want to do similar films that reflect our culture.

I'm more comfortable watching 'Dev D' with my mom than a film that makes a woman an object whose only purpose is to dance provocatively.

I might say 'let's get married' because I am not rigid, I live moment to moment. These are my views and it is person to person, one should not get influenced with what I am saying.

The only sense marriage makes is to share property, your children inherit the name and all that... it is all legal reasons to get married and no reason for love.