The Anees Bazmee-directed film, No Entry (2005), which starred Salman Khan, Anil Kapoor, Bipasha Basu and others, is all set to release in Marathi. Titled No Entry — Pudhe Dhoka Aahey, the film has been produced by Premnath Rajagopalan and Nikhil Saini of Underground Films. It has been directed by Ankush Chaudhari, who incidentally also plays the lead role in the film, which was essayed by Salman Khan in the Hindi version. “No Entry was a family entertainer. It has already been adapted down South and is a tried-and-tested formula,” says Nikhil, who is also the creative head of Boney Kapoor’s BSK Network and Entertainment.

“Almost 38 per cent of Bollywood’s earnings come from Maharashtra. And the Marathi audience would love to see their regional stars in a comic caper like this,” says Ankush. “We spoke to Anees, who directed the original and also wrote the screenplay. He wanted the film to be as close to the Bollywood version as possible.” Have they managed to achieve that? “The essence of the film is the same, but we’ve added little Marathi touches. It’s a big-budget film and has been shot like a Bollywood movie.”

The cast also includes Marathi actors Bharat Jadhav (Anil Kapoor’s role), Aniket Vishwas Rao (Fardeen Khan’s role), Saie Tamhankar (Bipasha Basu’s role), Kranti Redkar (Lara Dutta Bhupathi’s role), Manava Naik (Celina Jaitley’s role) and Sai Lokur (Esha Deol’s role).