Based on a series of avant-garde vines by creator Albert Birney, Sylvio is the story of Baltimore based gorilla Sylvio Bernardi’s rise and fall from local TV fame. Sylvio’s droll 9 to 5 is interrupted when he is sent to collect the debt of a small talk show producer, and is mistaken for a juggling guest. The fallout of Sylvio’s clumsy juggling is not just broken vases–the viewers fall in love with Sylvio’s chaotic and destructive ape persona. As a result, Sylvio’s personal preferences for tender puppetry and delicate stop motion are put at direct odds with the character he finds himself playing for his human viewers. As Sylvio’s identity crisis mounts fantasy and reality poetically blur to reveal that he has been fighting the “beast” image for years. Sylvio is a downright lovely and absurdist cult classic that speaks to anyone who fails to live out their stereotype.
