Ahmed Sylla starring in a 16th feature film

Every day, a personality invites itself into the world of Élodie Suigo. Wednesday April 17, 2024: comedian and actor, Ahmed Sylla. He is starring in Ludovic Bernard’s new film: “Here and There”.

Ahmed Sylla is this actor with a constant, contagious and always sincere smile. An actor who first met his audience in the Samba Showbut also the café theaters before his first major cinema roles in The Ascension by Ludovic Bernard in 2017, Each for all by Vianney Lebasque in 2018 or even Turkey by Jalil Lespert in 2019.

Wednesday April 17, he is showing in the film Here and there by Ludovic Bernard. It’s the story of Adrien and Sékou, two cousins ​​who don’t look like one at all. Adrien has been living in Senegal for 15 years with his partner Aminata and they are waiting for a happy event until he is sent back to France for lack of visa. He arrives at his cousin Sékou, a salesman in Paris, who will take him on incredible adventures through a tour of France. Sékou, in fact, needs him as a cover to be accepted in an environment where origins matter enormously because we are talking about the land.

franceinfo: this film recounts immigration policies and highlights everyday aberrations except that here, for once, it’s reversed. Is that what you liked?

Ahmed Sylla: Yes. First of all, what I liked is that this film is a bit like what I am in life. I am Franco-Senegalese and to have a film that highlights Senegal and France in beauty, I was immediately won over.

It’s a sort of homage that you pay to your mother through this scenario. Your parents left Senegal in the 1980s and struggled to integrate. Your mother bled to offer you the best schools in Nantes. It also focuses on ordinary racism, on the clichés that we can have, but on both sides. Have you suffered it?

I suffered it as a child, but it is perhaps sometimes more violent because we don’t realize it and it comes back years later. When I got to primary school, I understood that I was different, because I came out of my neighborhood and there, I was the only one. Right away, I get noticed a little more and when I’m refused to play football with my friends, you wonder why. And then, when in sixth grade, you get your first racist joke, it’s violent. I was confronted with this. Afterwards, I am someone who always sees the glass half full, I try never to fall into (I don’t like this word) “victimization”. There are victims of racism today in France, but I try not to fall into that and always see the optimistic side of the problem.

This film is about the importance of integrating without forgetting our traditions, our culture, our values, what ultimately constitutes us?

Yes, that’s what this film is about. You have to accept yourself and you don’t need to deny what you are originally to be fully French.

“Today, there are certain people who politically take away our right to be French and confiscate the flag while I, this blue, white, red flag, I love it, I find it beautiful, I find it Magnificent.”

Ahmed Sylla

at franceinfo

There is no one right way to be French. It hurts me that we are discussing and debating who should be French, who should not be. It’s frustrating.

You grew up under the watchful eye of your mother. Having had to convince her that being an actor was a real job and that you were going to be able to earn a living like that, is that what made you stronger?

That’s the beauty of my journey, to give her that little bit of pride when she sees me on television or in my shows and calls me to say: “Well done ! “. This is where I really succeeded.

“If I’m successful in my mother’s eyes, I’m successful. As long as she’s proud of me, I’m the happiest man in the world because I know how complicated it was for her.”

Ahmed Sylla

at franceinfo

It is clear that family also remains the basis of this film. Are you touched to be in the family photo of a large part of your audience?

It’s weird but I never said to myself: I’m not part of the family. I’m French, I don’t wonder how. I’m here and I don’t want it to be a fight. It’s natural. Most of France understood this. I will never in my life say that France is racist. There are problems of racism in France, whether, for example, in hiring, in the banking system, but most of France, everyday French people are not racist. Otherwise it would be chaos when it isn’t, even if they try to tell us otherwise.

Finally, when you were a little boy and you encountered theater, it was a revelation. That’s what gave you your oxygen. Today, humor remains your pillar, your breadcrumb trail?

Yes. When we see what’s happening at the moment and I find myself on stage for two hours in the evening, laughing, making films, I say to myself: I did well to discover the theater. In any case, that’s what saved me. And what’s funny and paradoxical is that I never wanted to do this job. When I took to the stage at school, it was to improve my average at the end of the year. Humor is my pillar, it’s the most beautiful thing. To see the laughter, the smile on your face… When I see that you have that smile, it makes me feel good, it makes me happy.