Somersfield Student Yassine Chentouf Shines as Bermuda’s Youngest Comedian

Young Achiever: Yassine Chentouf. (Photo by Robert Daniels Photography)

April 14, 2014 — “Emma, pull yourself together!”

Stand-up comedian Yassine Chentouf delivers the punchline to his joke with a sniper’s accuracy. Roars of laughter follow. He tells the story in an affected child’s voice, rolling the hard vowels and consonants into W’s, so ‘Emma’ sounds like ‘Emwah’, and ‘Together’ is pronounced ‘Togewah.’ This affectation is doubly hilarious because Yassine, who for all intents and purposes is a stage-hardened comedian, is just eleven years old. He’s a middle-schooler on a mission: to make Bermuda laugh.

The son of Chewstick co-founder Najib Chentouf, Yassine has grown up among the ‘Chew Crew’, whom he adamantly calls family. His mother, Maryem Biadillah, says the group helps him develop his ‘craft’ - as if it’s perfectly normal for her son to have what is practically a profession at just eleven-year-old.

But Yassine was never pushed into comedy. He said he was nine when he first performed his act, but Ms Biadillah knows better.

“He was three,” she said, turning to her son. “At the Ag Show, remember?”

“That’s embarrassing,” said Yassine, shifting awkwardly in his seat, before telling his side of the story.

“The first time I ever did a good comedy routine, I was probably nine.”

His first joke, performed at the annual Somersfield Academy talent show, was the ‘Emwah’ story, first told to him by his father. It’s now a regular part of his routine.

“I work on it and I change it every month. My dad heard it when he was in college, and he performed it on stage. Now we’ve performed it on stage together.”

Yassine credits his father for the precocious sense of humor he seems so at ease with. His comedy is physical, lyrical, and if you’re expecting to force out a few chuckles just to be nice, you’ll be pleasantly surprised. He’s not just a funny eleven year old, he’s just funny period.

“My father has always been a really funny guy. He’s the funniest person I know, and I grew up always loving to laugh. Whenever I heard some people laughing - and a lot of people would say: ‘stop being pokey’ - I’d go and say ‘hey, what’s the joke?’ One of the best feelings I’ve ever had was making people laugh.”

Yassine said growing up in the Chewstick family has helped him both creatively and socially. He’s even led an entire workshop on his own about greek mythology during one of the group’s annual retreats.

Perhaps most telling about Yassine is that his talent is not limited to being funny. He’s grown up around music, story-telling, poetry, art - the kind of creativity a young Bermudian could never have been exposed to growing up 15 years ago.

“He’s a true testament to the good work that Chewstick does,” said Stratton Hatfield, one of Yassine’s many local fans.

He loves art, science, and technology, proudly proclaiming he can use Adobe Photoshop and Illustrator. He also writes poetry, although: “I don’t do it that often.”

“The Chewstick family are a very big part of my life,” said Yassine, and it shows.

Originally published in The Royal Gazette