Hip-Hop artist, screen-writer and former collegiate athlete, Sylvester “Sly” Alexis was born in Los Angeles to actress Mädchen Amick and musician David Alexis. Sly spent his formative years split between Oahu, Hawaii and Santa Barbara, California where he attended the alternative education of Rudolf Steiner’s Waldorf School.  There, he and his sister Mina, were encouraged to develop not only academically but artistically and spiritually.  

Sly moved with his family at the age of ten to Connecticut where he and his sister began to flourish as youth athletes. Sly won his first ‘National Championship’ at the age of twelve, winning in the long jump and establishing a new national record. In high school, Sly became a prolific running back for his school’s competitive football program, having several 200 yard plus and multi-touchdown games. But it would be track and field that would bring young Sylvester the most recognition as one of the fastest sprinters in the country, receiving several ‘All-American’ honors.

After being injured in the final football game of his junior year, Sly decided to focus on track and field, due in large part to the mounting list of scholarships he was being offered from top universities like Oregon, Oklahoma, and UC Irvine. Sly and his nomadic family decided to move once again to San Francisco for the second half of his junior year. He graduated with honors from the prestigious St. Ignatius College Preparatory School where he still holds the school record in the 4x1 relay and 200 meter dash. He is one the all-time top sprinters the school has ever produced.

Accepting a full-ride scholarship to the University of California at Irvine, Sly became one of the track and field team’s top athletes as an incoming freshman, where he unfortunately witnessed a tragic event on campus that would change the course of his future. This event would end up becoming the trigger to expose an underlying genetic predisposition to a mental illness that would force him to drop out of school and begin the fight of his life as he searched for an accurate diagnosis and appropriate treatment.

While he and his family fought a broken mental health care system, Sly was bounced around by treatment center after treatment center. The one inspirational anchor he always found was writing and music. He began to foster his love for hip-hop and rap which led him to sign to an indie label and release his first album. Since then, Sly has gone on to produce other artists having the focus of supporting and celebrating other sober musicians. He has gone on to release several successful videos including Professor and Spoken, directed by actress/director (and his mother) Mädchen Amick.

Currently, Sylvester not only works as a patient advocate at a treatment facility, but has also used his first hand experience to become a passionate advocate and spokesperson to help change the landscape of the mental health world. He has advocated with organizations such as Bring Change 2 Mind, SAMHSA and NAMI - who have all partnered with, he and his family’s, non-profit foundation Don’t MIND Me to bring hope, change, and education to others that have been affected by mental health challenges.