Wil Sylvince : Syllables, Fat, & Celibacy
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Wil Sylvince : Syllables, Fat, & Celibacy

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Wil Sylvince is honestly funny and humble – a stand-up completely in his element on stage. He lets you into his life and times with a beguiling charm and an almost old-fashioned gentlemanly manner, apologising for his more risqué jokes before he tells them. He’s having a huge amount of fun on stage, his act comes across as natural and sincere and he makes good solid jokes.

 

A native New Yorker, Sylvince was strictly brought up by his Haitian parents and his anecdotes about his early life are funny and truly interesting. He shares his stories with a great sense of intimacy, and although he’s clearly working the stage, you feel like you’re hearing anecdotes told to you by a friend at a party. Hearing him imitate his parents’ accents is hilarious – he gives us a bit of Haitian Creole and then translates it – and he ties up his stories of family poverty, his struggles with English and his early school experiences with a raconteur’s flair informed by sincerity.

 

The underlying story is a sad one, never presented as such, but beneath the laughter there’s a heartbreaking tale about the discipline imposed on him by loving but deeply conservative parents struggling to make a life in the States. Sylvince talks about overcoming obesity, hard to believe looking at him – he’s lean and muscular (he should show the audience photos of his former self, I reckon). He mentions he’s celibate but never explains why, although it’s a set-up for jokes about tossing himself off to excess, but you don’t buy it.  

 

BY LIZA DEZFOULI

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