Lil Duval Talks Giving Back, Meet The Blacks and Comedy with BE Magazine

Lil Duval has always been a character. From his funny tweets to his sitcom Guy Code, you are bound to laugh. Lil Duval gets serious with BE Magazine. Talks about motivating the youth, social media comedians vs. stand up comedians and Meet The Blacks.

BE Magazine: Why did you want to become a Comedian?

Lil Duval: Might sound cliché now because everyone says it but back in the day. I knew I wanted to BE since day one. I knew it was something I wanted to do because it was back when no one wanted to do it and it wasn’t a big thing to do. Evidently I was supposed to do it. It wasn’t popular. It was something that was seen on TV but you never thought you could actually do it.

BE Magazine: You started off with stand up?

Lil Duval: Yes I started off with stand up first. At Uptown in Atlanta, I got on stage on a Sunday night. The hosting comedian gave me my first mic, I got on stage and I did good. The first time going to a comedy club was my first time getting on stage. I thought once you do that you will blow up, so I was like “ what I do next”? I was told I had to come back Wednesday and do it again. This all started by putting my name on the list (which you put your name on a list to get pick and do a set on stage) and my name got picked, and after making the crowd laugh I thought I was Chris Tucker. This was before we had the Internet to do research; all we had was what we thought.

BE Magazine:  Do you think social media helps or hurts comedians at this time?

Lil Duval: Not really. It all depends on what you use it for like anything else. I think it’s opened up a whole other lane for comedy for people. It didn’t hurt standup at all. It might hurt the young people that don’t understand what he difference between standup and what being a comedian is because the Internet gives you the false sense of you doing good or being professionals because its simple. The difference between me and anyone else is I was one of the first to do it. I understand both sides of doing stand up and being funny online. But to the average person that think being funny online, they think they doing hard work, they think its easy, they think its really genius. But its really simple as hell until they get on stage. It’s all different elements of comedy. It makes it better for me. Those people make my job easy because they can’t do what I do I can do what they do all day. I showed them how to do it. They can’t do what I do.

BE Magazine: So your name “Lil Duval” clearly comes from your hometown Jacksonville, what do you do in your community?

Lil Duval: I do a lot of things. I give back to my community every year and do things here and there for them. But most importantly, I give them inspiration to see somebody from where they are from and having the whole world saying Duval (most people don’t even know what Duval means). People don’t realize the most important thing to give anyone is inspiration. When I came up I didn’t see no one that looked like me. If I would’ve came up when Mayweather was a champion, I would’ve been a boxer. When you see someone that looks like you or you can identify with them, that would inspire you. I can give money all the time but the money is not going to take you longer than what you can implement in the minds of the youth.

BE Magazine: With the new movie “Meet the Black”, Why should everyone who haven’t seen it go out and watch it now?

Lil Duval: BEcause it a funny movie. I know with some black people you have to twist their arms to go out to watch, but I’m not going to say anything else. This movie is not for everybody. At the end of the day, this movie is for a demographic that hasn’t BEen half dead for a long time. Very few movies that look like the urban demographic in the movie theater or for the age group from 18-30. It’s great for that demographic and that voice. Its not going to BE a 12 years of slavery but it is a funny comedy that was done right. You going to laugh. I guarantee that you are going to laugh if you don’t then you don’t like to BE happy.

To read the full interview head over to BE Magazine. Meet The Blacks is in theaters right now!

#Comedy #LilDuval #MeetTheBlacks