Anil Kapoor slips into the shoes of Fenny Khan for Rakeysh Omprakash Mehra's official Hindi remake of the Oscar nominated Dutch film, Everybody's Famous
Sanyukta Iyer (MUMBAI MIRROR; June 24, 2016)

Even as Rakeysh Omprakash Mehra's Mirzya, which features debutantes Harshvardhan Kapoor and Saiyyami Kher is gearing up for a big release on October 7, the writer-director has already started prepping up for his next production. The comedy-musical, Fanney Khan, will mark the directorial debut of Atul Manjrekar, with Mehra as producer. Atul has been a part of the ad world for a decade and is a long-time associate of Mehra.

Featuring Anil Kapoor in the lead, the film is the official Hindi remake of the critically acclaimed drama, Everybody's Famous!, directed in English and Dutch by Dominique Deruddere. The film released in 2000 and was nominated from Belgium for the Best Foreign Language Film at the 73rd Academy Awards. It lost to Ang Lee's Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, the official entry from Taiwan.

Anil steps into the shoes of 64-year-old European actor-writer Josse De Pauw, known for the drama Crazy Love and the thriller Hombres Complicados, hailed as "the first cinematic gem from The Netherlands".

The film follows 17-year-old Marva, a regular at singing contests which she never wins. When her father, Jean, gets laid off, he decides to abduct the number one singer in the country, Debbie. The kidnapping increases sales of Debbie's latest single, much to the surprise of Michael, her manager, who barters a secret deal to make Marva a star if Jean agrees to keep Debbie out of the way for as long as he wants.

"Music will be the soul of this father-daughter film but the setting will be desi, with peppy numbers. Anil will be at his quirky best as Fanney Khan. Recording and prep kicked off on June 20, casting for the two teenagers is presently underway," adds a source close to the development.