Taza Äzilder, a project created by Almaty Air Initiative in collaboration with Almaty Central Standup Club and Kazakhstani filmmaker Kuanish Beysek, turns sharp satire into a tool for discussing Almaty’s most painful issue — the air. It is humor that makes you laugh first, and think immediately after. The project’s creative producer is Kuanish Beysek.

What happens if you invite smog for an honest interview? Can a smoke-filled teahouse become a metaphor for the whole city? And what does Santa Claus look like after breathing megacity air for years — and using the New Year moment to finally say what matters? The answers lie in Taza Äzilder, Kazakhstan’s first eco-themed stand-up performance, released on the YouTube channel of Almaty Central Standup Club on New Year’s Eve.

This is more than a comedy episode. It is an artistic short film produced by Almaty Air Initiative together with the team of renowned Kazakhstani director Kuanish Beysek and Almaty Central Standup Club. The project breaks the usual patterns of talking about air pollution, offering a fresh angle through absurdity, irony, and, at times, dark humor.

Zhuldys Saulebekova, Executive Director of Almaty Air Initiative:
 “We speak about air not only in the language of numbers and research, but also through strong visuals and creative formats — they are among our most powerful tools.
 Taza Äzilder is our second humor-based project this year. In summer, together with Bayguys, we released the comedy mini-series Mstitelder. At first glance, this seems like just a New Year show. In fact, it is a way to summarize everything that concerned Almaty residents throughout the year and to offer a new perspective on the topic of air. We thank Kuanish Beysek, Aigerim Inayat and the entire Almaty Stand-Up team.”

Kuanish Beysek’s directorial vision (film Dästür, projects Irina Kairatovna and others) turned stand-up monologues into a series of surreal, yet painfully familiar visual novellas. The performers appear not in a classic comedy club, but in exaggerated, hyper-symbolic environments of a future-that-has-already-arrived Almaty: in thick smog, inside a smoke-filled teahouse, in an old rattling taxi, or on a square with a New Year tree made of car tires — where distributing masks has become routine.

Kuanish Beysek, Creative Producer:
 “What we work with here is not humor in its usual sense, but satire. It is a more accurate and honest language that lets us speak about painful issues without simplifying them or avoiding responsibility.
 It brings the topic of air closer to the viewer not through fear or dry statistics, but through personal experience. We worked deliberately with imagery to make the invisible tangible, and the familiar – disturbingly recognizable. If a viewer pauses to think and feels the urge to change something around them, then this conversation was not in vain.”

Participants:
 Talgat Tynymbai interviews the city’s silent yet central “character” – the smog.
 Ruslan Tai seeks logic within absurdity in the heart of a smoke-filled teahouse.
 Dariga Bilal, as a weary volunteer, reflects on generations and smog as their unexpected common point.
Ansagan philosophizes about the “system” behind the wheel of an old rattling taxi leaving a toxic exhaust trail.
Mukhtar Yerlan, as Santa Claus, delivers a tense holiday conclusion with a loudspeaker in hand.

The premiere of Taza Äzilder took place on December 30 on the YouTube channel of Almaty Central Standup Club:
 https://youtu.be/dw2V8hhSJsg?si=Yukkwc6sU1SlGlMQ