ActOne accuses Lush Productions of bribery

KARACHI - ActOne, Karachi’s oldest and most prestigious center for arts and wellness since its inception in 2006, will sue Lush Productions, a theatre production company managed by Usama Qazi and Waqas Bukhari, on accusations of bribery, dishonesty and mis-commitments. ActOne, which has been involved with musicals like ‘Chicago’, ‘Conversations’ and ‘Karachi, The Musical’, was approached by Lush Productions last November for a musical ‘la Cage Aux Folles’. A mutual agreement was reached that ActOne will be providing choreography, a rehearsal studio, and the dancers. In return the revenues generated from the third night would be given to ActOne. Five days before the show, Lush informed ActOne that the third night had been sold to a sponsor. Upon hearing this ActOne responded by asking them to pay the revenues of the third night. They refused and misbehaved with the female management of ActOne. The company has been a home of dancers, who dance with passion and ambition and for many, dance is their only source of income. They are hard-working and underpaid artists who earn a living through gigs. In protest, ActOne stopped the rehearsals. Lush tried bribing the dancers to join them. The ActOne dancers refused. Lush Production owes ActOne Rs 450,000 in revenues for the third night of the play. Two days before the rehearsals ActOne contacted Lush again and this time asked them to pay Rs 350,000 to cover the cost of the dancers and choreographers. Lush refused and instead offered the ActOne dancers thrice the signing amount they were originally receiving. They later contacted another choreographer for the show. Lush later announced that 70-80 dancers backed out of the show, while according to ActOne, only 9 dancers refused the gig. ActOne has made numerous contributions to the world of dance and theatre since its inception and has been responsible for the first ever documented flash mob, a world record for conducting the highest number of flash mobs, the first ever underground reality dance show and the first BBoy battle. ActOne has flown in internationally renowned dance instructors to teach at the institute. To date ActOne has instructed more than 6,000 students which includes giving workshops at Indus Valley and other institutes.