Kazakhstan comes to the Fringe with Kazakh Princess Diaries, a solo jazz and cabaret-style musical comedy about Tomi, a spoiled and (and slightly selfish) young woman whose fast-paced and luxurious life is about to be turned upside down.
She discovers she’s the heir to the Kazakh throne, and suddenly finds herself in a rural reality in a country that represents her roots, but one she knows nothing about.
After ‘months of writing, singing, dancing, sweating, and crying a little’, what began as writer and performer Aisha Kalymzhanova’s graduation project from acting school in Berlin has now been catapulted onto an Edinburgh stage.
A satire of Kazakh stereotypes, this one-woman show features six quirky characters (all portrayed by Kalymzhanova), original cabaret songs, a glimpse of the Kazakh language, and a journey of self-discovery.
SNACK sat down with Aisha to discuss performing at the Fringe for the first time.Â
Hello, Aisha! Can you give us an overview of your show?
Sure! It’s a musical comedy, with cabaret and jazz, about my culture. When I started living in Berlin, I realised no one really knows Kazakhstan. So I wanted to do this show where everything I am gonna say will be the truth, with all the nice stuff and some not nice stuff at all. There’s three songs, six characters, a lot of movement, and yelling!
Would you say that everything we experience in the show is an accurate representation of Kazakhstan as it truly is?
In my life and childhood, yes. When Kazakh people came to see me, I was so scared they were going to say that it’s not true, but they loved it. I felt so much better. I can’t say that whatever is going on in the show is the perfect representation, with all the jokes and everything, but it was true for me.
How are you experiencing your first time at Edinburgh Fringe?
It’s so overwhelming, but it’s nice that you still perform every night, even if people will be there or not. The difficult part is bringing the audience – as you saw, I was very shocked when I saw people there. Yesterday there were only two people watching me – it kind of broke my ego – and I was like, ‘oh, so this is how it works here’. Overall, it’s been so nice to bring my Kazakh princess here. I came here with my friend from acting school, who’s doing my tech and also doing a show at the Fringe [Down the Hole], tand herefore we helped each other a lot with our performances. I don’t know how I could have done it alone – you can just see other people with their teams – and for us it’s just counting on each other.
Why did you decide to have a princess as the main part of the story?
It was my first idea. I love Disney and jazz, and I wanted to make a story about princesses. I thought about doing a story about the Princess of Kazakhstan, but in Disney [style]. Everyone thinks that she’s Mulan; but I’m not Mulan, I’m the Kazakh one [laughs]. I wrote the songs for the show, made the melody, and I had a team who helped me with the arrangements and some instrumentals. Now everything is on Spotify too!
How did you find having to act in six different characters?
I wanted to have more, like ten, but my director said it was too much. I always saw these characters when I was a child, and I wanted to show people how so many aunties in my life are like the auntie in the show. They are so similar to each other, it’s crazy, and I loved changing the characters all the time. I am really bad at writing, so before creating the show I was doing improvisations, and telling my class ‘okay, guys, I’m going to improvise now, this is what it’s happening’. Then I was recording and re-watching to see when people were laughing. Then I put those parts together and created a whole performance!Â
Kazakh Princess Diaries is on at studio@C ARTS, C Venues until 24th August.
edfringe.com/tickets/whats-on/kazakh-princess-diaries
Photos by Veronica Buccino
