Meera All Set To Make Her Stage Show Debut With ‘Selfie Queen’

Zamana hey theatre ka! Stage pe apney jalwey dikhaney ka!” One of the biggest entertainers from Lollywood era Meera seems to have taken this dialogue from her comeback film Baaji quite seriously and in all its literal meanings now that the news of her first-ever stage performance has surfaced.

That’s right! Meera would be performing in one of Faisalabad’s commercial theatres for the first time in her career. The show called Selfie Queen is all set to start its run from 11th September.

Financial struggles are the reason?

Some time ago Meera had requested financial aid from the Punjab Government. The Artists Support Fund was created to support the senior artists of the country that are going through financial struggles due to lack of work. Meera had requested a whopping sum of 40 million rupees from the Artists Support Fund citing the reason that she needed the money to get through the pandemic.

Meera’s request was rejected unanimously as, as per the Fund’s rules, an artist can only be paid up to 10 thousand rupees. Looks like Meera has now turned to more practical ways of supporting herself financially.

The news may not come as surprise considering the dwindling work opportunities Pakistani artists are having in the pandemic hit world which only added further misery to the shrinking film industry of Pakistan. In such a scenario Meera’s detour to commercial theatre could be considered no less than a natural progression of events.

The presence of a superstar from the 90s in a stage mujra would surely be an intriguing factor for the commercial theatre fans and could big moolahs to the producers of the show. For an artist who has worked in both commercial and critically acclaimed films in Pakistani cinema, Meera is perhaps the biggest name who would be performing on Punjab’s rather infamous commercial theatre scene.

Not the first case

There have been a few names earlier too who migrated from films to the theatre. Before Meera, the biggest name has to be that of another 90s film star named Nargis. Nargis performed in various Punjabi and Urdu films before opting for a parallel career as a stage performer. She became the queen of commercial theatre in Punjab. People would flock to see her dancing on the stage thus making her the highest-paid stage actor for a long time in the theatre’s history. She was reportedly paid up to Rs. 25 Lakhs for one of her performances. Meera could be just the name to outshine the huge crowd puller that Nargis used to be.

Speaking of the 90s, Madiha Shah is another name from the same era who worked in mainstream Pakistani Urdu and Punjabi films opposite actors like Shaan and Javed Sheikh to name a few. She remained active in Lollywood during the 1980s and 1990s. Later she moved to the commercial stage as an alternative career option. Madeeha Shah was last seen in Syed Noor’s Shaan-Saima romantic flick Majanan as supporting lead. The film itself was a commercial success and Shah was praised for her performance in it.

Zara Akbar was another star who surprised many when she moved from her rather somber yet critically acclaimed TV career to the commercial theatre. Zara Akbar performed lead roles in many of PTV’s and private production dramas. She had surprised many people when she suddenly started working on stage. Her performances were, as per commercial theatre’s norm of course, raunchy and raised many eyebrows. Zara cited her struggling economic status as the reason to dance in the commercial stage.

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