Mana cinemavallu are doing an amazing job of acting onscreen... and offscreen too. While the so-called top heroes and heroines play to the gallery to entertain us with lines and scenes that perpetuate sexual violence and gender stereotypes, they also ‘act’ pretty well on social media to undo their toxic onscreen image by demanding justice for Dishas and Nirbhayas. A look at how Tollywood contradicts itself with its films and offscreen philosophies.
Yekkadaraa aa Sye Ra Narasimha Reddy. Ippudochi narakamani cheppu. Yeda boyindu? An impassionate movie buff’s video about how our heroes are that just onscreen and don’t show enough spine in real life went viral and brought back the focus on mana cinemavallu and their antics offscreen. In the last week, ever since the news of Disha’s rape and murder broke, cinema celebs have been making statements in press conferences and on social media like nobody’s business. That even most memes about Friday’s encounter of the four accused in the veterinary doctor’s incident have a cinema connection stands testimony to how much cinema has seeped into our lives and our psyche.
The question, however, is, is there any alignment between what our actors do onscreen and what they are seeing offscreen. In fact, it is shocking to see how some top actors have had the biggest blockbusters in which they have displayed toxic masculinity, all in the name of ‘script demands’ but go on to condone the same when such incidents happen in real life. A case in point is actor Vijay Deverakonda, aka Rowdy to his fans. While his movie Arjun Reddy has got enough screen and column space about the message it has subliminally been sending, his tweet ‘Stand up to any wrong behaviour, correct them and make them understand. And those who don’t behave like humans deserve no human rights, Give them what they deserve’ seems to be a complete U-turn for his role in the movie. Even in his more ‘recent and decent’ role as Govind in Geetha Govindam, he leaves no stone unturned in trying to kiss a girl without her consent in a bus ride and capture it as a selfie.
Says Tejaswini P, an independent communications consultant in the city who often raises her voice concerning gender rights, “Our stars take the easy way out to tweet online, more like a token gesture without feeling the need to act or work in movies which send out the right message. Such words, therefore, seem to have no impact on the youth. It’s only when what they say and what they do in movies matches what they say in life is when it matters.”
Powerstar Pawan Kalyan is known to mouth dialogues that literally swears to yank out the intestines of those who harass women in movies like Kaatamrayudu, but the same actor-turned-politician took a different stance when it came to reacting about the encounter on Friday morning. He said the rapists be caned than be killed in an encounter. Of course, the actors will always tell that after all, it was a movie, and has got nothing to do with real life. If only the fans learned to differentiate between those two!
It was nice of actor Manchu Manoj to come out in the public to talk to Disha’s family and express his views on respecting women and preventing sexual violence against them. However, the Potugadu actor in the same movie talks about how women pretend to be Sati Savitris but go wild in the pubs, stereotyping girls as certain characters who visit pubs.
Earlier this year, RX100 starring Karthikeya and Payal Rajput was ridden with violence and voyeurism. Although the actor is wronged in this one, the other characters leave no stone unturned in the character assassination of the girl in this consensual relationship.
Earlier on Friday, the Telangana Mahila Congress Committee led by Nerella Sarada talked about how everything from movies to porn clips could lead to subliminal messaging that wrongly conveys that women are the inferior gender.
“The messages are confusing to today’s youth,” the committee said. Dear actors, it sounds jarring when what you do onscreen contradicts what you say offscreen. The former is equally, if not more, impactful than what you say in real life. So can we have some sensitivity towards your fans and audiences and stop displaying these two faces? We are not comfortable with the two faces of Tollywood. We will soon revolt against this.