Provocative Giraffe

07/10/2022

A BIG thanks to the writers and to Mixát Udvar and to everyone who came out to help make a fun evening.

Here's the setlist from October's show:

01/10/2022

Why Maggie Is Still Single

extract from Epic Love Fails

Don't miss the next Provocative Giraffe show - Technologically Challenged - on Monday, 3 October

26/09/2022

Provocative Giraffe in 3 minutes:

06/09/2022

A BIG thanks to Mixát and to everyone who came out to help make a fun evening.
Spread the word: Provocative Giraffe is the place to be the 1st Monday of the month.
Here's what we shared in September. We're already looking forward to October's show. Hope to see you there.

29/08/2022

What's all the fuss about?

Jennifer Deborah Walker vs Michaël Wertenberg

Provocative Giraffe present: Epic Love FailsMonday, September 5, 2020 19:00@Mixát Udvar Krúdy u 7, Budapesthttps://www.facebook.com/provocativegiraffeMusic b...

28/08/2022

Interview with Michaël Wertenberg
Thanks to Joon Filmlab for the photo

🦒 How Did Provocative Giraffe Come About?

In August 2021, a poet who was passing through Budapest "organised" an event to showcase his poetry. He invited me and a few other writers to participate. A few days before the event, he left the country. He asked me to take over, host the event, and salvage it the best I could. So at the last minute, I gathered some of my fellow writer friends and we had a reading of some of our work.

The event was so much fun, we decided to make it a regular thing. Since then, we’ve bounced around from venue to venue trying to find the right fit. We continue tweaking the format and inviting new writers to join in on the adventure.

🦒 What Can You Tell Us About the Process of Putting the Show Together?

Herein lies the biggest change the show has undergone. It started off with writers creating on their own then coming together the night of the show to share their creations. I quickly lost interest in that format. Now, we take a far more collaborative approach.

We get together on Monday nights and spend three hours writing and sharing around an agreed-upon theme. Some choose to write solo pieces, others choose to write pieces for multiple readers. We try to experiment, take chances, and expand our respective comfort zones. And we have a lot of fun in the process.

🦒 How Does One Get Invited To Participate in Provocative Giraffe?

I love the enthusiasm the shows are generating. Through Provocative Giraffe, I’ve been privileged to meet and collaborate with a variety of creatives I wouldn’t have otherwise. We continue to grow, and we add new people to our collective with every show. But we are selective.

Firstly, we only invite past audience members. There’s no point bringing someone onboard who hasn’t seen a Provocative Giraffe show already. What we attempt to do is too weird and too much unlike other events that it’s simply best to see it rather than to try to explain it.

It’s also important to note that Provocative Giraffe is a collective of writers. We appreciate other forms of expression: improv, acting, stand-up, etc. but beyond that, participants write – meaning they produce text on a piece of paper. Also, participants must own a pair of dress shoes. Provocative Giraffe has a dress code for performers.

The best course of action is to check out the show. And if any writer – be they amateur, professional, or aspiring – thinks it would be something they’d like to participate in, they should talk to one of the performers after the show. We’re always looking to meet and collaborate with new creatives.

25/08/2022

Interview with Stephen Collison

🦒 What Brought You to, then Kept You in, Budapest?

I used to work in finance for IBM, and they sent me to Budapest to manage a team. I pretty much fell in love with the city on the first day, and hoped to stay at least beyond my one-year assignment. 13 years later and I still call Budapest my home: finance gave way to film-making – but now I do a bit of both, and spend a bit more time in the UK too.

🦒 Can You Tell Us About Your Creative Journey?

I've always been creating and performing ever since I was a kid, but the scientific side of my brain won out over the artistic initially, so I first pursued a corporate career. But with a friendly and open creative community in Budapest, along with accessible venues, the right side of my brain got the upper hand through filmmaking, photography, music, acting, stand-up, improv, writing and podcasting.

🦒 How Did You Get Involved With Provocative Giraffe?

Friend and long-time Provocative Giraffe stalwart, Esther Holbrook, told me about her involvement with a writer/performer show, so I attended their next performance and discovered that I knew almost everyone on the roster! The Michael Wertenberg-penned opening skit seemed to have been written with my sense of humour in mind, and the ensuing line up of subtle, irreverent and unobtrusive gems seemed to fill a well-needed gap in the Budapest live circuit. Michael, who had seen my infamous 'lamp' performance, offered me a place in the troupe, and the rest is history!

🦒 Can You Tell Us About Your Writing Process and Ethos?

My motto is: 'Everything is writing. Except writing itself, which is anything but writing!'. By this I mean that ideas and planning are at the heart of everything we do creatively, and the actual process of writing is merely conveying it in a form for it to be used or consumed – which can often be a mechanical and arduous task. I'd love to go back and tell my 12-year old self that those little camcorder skits I was coming up with, that was all writing! But I'm a tireless proponent of 'perfect' writing: a good idea is one thing, but there's a 'right' way in terms of form and ex*****on.

🦒 What Have You Recently Read or Seen That's Impressed You?

I only saw Antoine Fuqua's Training Day for the first time recently, which blew my mind. David Ayer's writing (and Denzel Washington's performance) is extraordinary – maintaining the ambiguity of the Alonzo character almost until the final act. I read John Wyndham's The Day of the Triffids last year and now have a new favourite book! The narrative is expertly constructed, and, like all great genre, it explores every possible facet of the conceit. The play God of Carnage also greatly impressed me, in the way that it used phone calls as an extra source of exposition – in the otherwise closed-dialogue restriction of the stage play.

🦒 What Are Your Plans for the Near Future?

I've shot half of my debut feature film, but life (and continuity issues – I'm acting in it too!) keep getting in the way of finishing it. I've made a pact with myself to rule out all other creative endeavours until it's done. Well, all except Provocative Giraffe!

20/08/2022

Interview with Olja Radlovic

🦒 For the pieces you will perform 5 Sept, at Provocative Giraffe: Epic Love Fails, what was the inspiration behind them?

My friend Andi and I had this improv act with a Slavic lady constantly looking for a husband and always failing. It made a lot of our friends laugh hard. Andi went back to Canada, and I’m bringing our Natasha (originally Olga, but had to change it as it’s too close to my name) to a wider audience with you guys now. We have to send her a video!

🦒 Do you have a specific method for writing? What can you tell us about it?

A lot of daydreaming, usually while washing dishes, walking, or staring at a ceiling, followed by hours and hours of writing, deleting, editing, loving it, hating it, feeling shame, and then pride. It works.

🦒 How did you get into writing?

Through acting. I joined Mind Reset Budapest three years ago and wrote a couple of scenes for a collaborative play. Then Tina, the director, asked me to write a script for a new one - unlike me, she had no doubt it would work. I wrote a dramedy I Didn’t See That Coming. She brought it to life with our amazing group of actors, and we had three successful, full-house performances in spring this year (we’ll continue in autumn). I also joined a lovely, supportive creative writing group and wrote around fifteen short stories, a novel in Serbian that I’m now sending to publishers, and now I’ll perform with the Provocative Giraffe. I’d say I’m just starting.

🦒 Do you have any advice for new writers?

Read, write, share your writing, talk about other writers’ work, believe in yourself and grow a thick skin because there will always be someone who doesn’t like your style and thinks they could do it better, even if they haven’t written a word in their life. If they have constructive criticism, consider it, but only if you feel they’re onto something. Otherwise, shake it off and move on.

🦒 What are your plans for the near future?

Write, act, travel. Not to jinx it, knocking on wood three times.

25/06/2022

Excerpt from Maggie's stand-up set in Borena, Ethiopia!

21/06/2022

Happy World Giraffe Day!

29/04/2022

Interview with Jennifer Deborah Walker

🦒 For the piece you will perform 2 May, at the Provocative Giraffe Creators’ Showcase #5, what was the inspiration behind it?

So, my cat likes to play chess but with her rules. Playing chess for her means kicking over random pieces and hoping I don’t notice. After reading Bulgakov’s Master and Margarita years ago, I always loved Behemoth and his vodka-swigging, chess-playing antics.

🦒 Do you have a specific method for writing? What can you tell us about it?

Force myself to write something even if I am not in the mood. The magic of the “right time to write” is as rare as the stars aligning, I prefer to write anything at a given time and consistently. Just get anything down on the page and edit later. Alcohol also helps, but make sure you edit sober.

🦒 What do you hope the audience will get out of your piece?

A laugh or two, or at least some absurdity that will make their heads spin.

🦒 How did you get into writing?

I had a nervous breakdown in the middle of my PhD in physics. I went to therapy and my therapist told me to find some other outlet than physics and self-destructive behaviour. I tried drawing, it was meh. I started writing and that got me fired up.

🦒 Do you have any advice for new writers?

Write. Even if it’s bad, just write. And read. Read a lot, write a lot, and you’re on your way.

🦒 Do you have any advice for future Provocative Giraffe participants?

Don’t be worried about being too weird. The bar is set high.

🦒 Who are some of your favourite writers, and what is it you like about their work?

I love magical realism, especially Salman Rudshdie. I’m also a huge fan of Nabokov and his use of language. I recommend you go beyond Lo**ta with his other books like Pale Fire and Pnin. Thomas Mann and Hermann Hesse are also other favourites.

🦒 What brought you to Budapest?

I’m half Hungarian and partly grew up here. I was living in Spain for 7 years and needed a change, and figured Budapest is a good choice, especially as I didn’t need to learn another language.

🦒 Has living in Budapest presented any specific challenges for you?

I am trying hard not to become a pessimist, which is easier said than done.

🦒 Are there any common misconceptions about your home country that you have come across while living in Budapest?

That British people have money :D

🦒 What are your plans for the near future?

I’ve been invited to write an essay on Hermann Hesse’s influence on K-Pop group BTS for an academic collection on Hesse with a big publisher, so fingers crossed this goes through as that’ll be my weirdest writing project to date. I’d also like to finish my novel – inspired by my life in Madrid but told from the point of view of furniture – at some point this year.