Mussum Forevis (Mussum Swap)

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About

Mussum Forevis (Mussum Forever) is a photoshop meme that involve superimposing the face of Mussum, a famous Brazilian actor, comedian and musician, into photographs of celebrities, historical and public figures, in similar vein to the Nic Cage as Everyone series. Oftentimes, these images are accompanied by captions imitating Mussum's comedic manner of speech.

Origin

The Internet's photoshop tribute to Mussum began in early October 2009, shortly after the International Olympic Committee's announcement of Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, as host of the upcoming 2016 Olympic Games. To celebrate the achievement, Brazilian illustrator Rodrigo Hashimoto tweeted a lampoon version of Barack Obama's "Hope" campaign poster featuring the face of Mussum and the caption: "Yes We Créu" (shown below).

However, illustrations and artworks inspired by Mussum had been circulating for months prior to Rodrigo Hashimoto's tweet. In June 2009, a social media campaign titled "Mussum Forevis" was launched across Brazil's humor blogs, Twitter and Facebook in remembrance of the 15th anniversary of Mussum's death.

Mussum

Born in Rio de Janeiro on April 7th, 1941, Antônio Carlos Bernardes Gomes, known on-stage as Mussum,^[1] was a Brazilian actor and musician, most well-known for being the breakout member of the Brazilian comedic group Os Trapalhões. From his debut as a samba band member in 1960 and until his death in 1994, Mussum starred in 27 movies with Os Trapalhões and 20 years of TV career. Among the most celebrated aspects of Mussum is his distinct style of speech, arbitrarily adding an "-is" or "-evis" at the end of his words, including "forevis" (as opposed to "forever").

Spread

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The phrase soon became a trending topic on Twitter, and Hashimoto's poster served as inspiration for many other parodies of well-known Brazilian celebrities, singers and even cartoon characters. Mussum Forevis pictures can be also seen on Tumblr.^[11]^[12] In July 2012, to celebrate 18 years after Mussum's passing, the advertising agency Strat Comunicação released a series of pictures of famous celebrities with Mussum's face photoshopped over them, in the style of the meme.^[13]
On February 2013, Volkswagen of Brazil released a new ad campaign of the New Beetle featuring Mussum. The commercials present the new version of the car to the people in the 70's.

Notable Examples

The Actor

Born in Rio de Janeiro on April 7th, 1941, Mussum began his career in 1960 with his samba musical band Os Originais do Samba^[2] (The Originals of Samba) and made his TV acting debut on the program Bairro Feliz in 1965, before joining the famous Brazilian comedy group Os Trapalhões.^[4] Mussum died on July 29, 1994, due to a complication after a heart transplant surgery.

Search Interest

Search interest for "Mussum" and "Mussum Forevis" reached a peak during mid-2009, due to the 15th anniversary of his death and celebrations of his work being made on the Internet. In 2012, search interest on the meme has resurged on Brazilian internet.