Is it true that one cargo company in Brazil employs three doubles of three Hollywood stars?

In 2024, messages went viral on social networks that three friends lived in a Brazilian province who became popular bloggers because of their resemblance to famous actors: Will Smith, Jackie Chan and Martin Lawrence. We have verified the accuracy of this story.

In December 2024, publics on VKontakte will be massively wrotethat three best friends allegedly live in Brazil, who work in an ordinary cargo company and at the same time bear a striking resemblance to actors Will Smith, Jackie Chan And Martin Lawrence, thanks to which they became very popular in a short time. Similar entries came out and autumn, but then they were mainly devoted only to men similar to Chan and Smith (some authors stated about the similarities with another artist - Chris Tucker). As evidence, such publications cited a selection of several photos and videos.

In "VKontakte» There are many similar posts available. Among the most popular are public posts “Movie Mania | Films and TV series" (twice: 2.1 million And 1.5 million views at the time of writing this analysis), “Worthy films” (three times: 2.9 million, 825,000 And 470,000) and "Commentator from God" (twice: 2.7 million And 363,000). Such publications can also be found on Telegram (examples here And here).

Alleged doubles of the actors are active on several social networks. For example, on Instagram* they have a common profile Bad Boys In Bahia (110,000 subscribers), whose title translated means “Bad Guys in [the Brazilian state of] Bahia.” Each of the bloggers on this social network also has their own personal pages: @willbaiano (3.2 million subscribers), @martinbaiano (817,000) and @jekibaiano (285,000) for Smith's doubles, Lawrence and Chan, respectively. The word baiano in usernames refers to people from the state of Bahia. On TikTok, a man who looks like Smith, 1.9 million subscribers, and the one that looks like Chana, - 1.2 million.

In the descriptions of the profiles of the three bloggers on Instagram, in addition to various contact information, the phrase Personagem #ia is indicated - translated from Portuguese this means “Character #AI”. That is, Internet celebrities themselves note that they use applications to change their appearance using neural networks. They also posted videos where they used artificial intelligence (AI) to change the faces of other people - and they became like Eddie Murphy, Wesley Snipes And Wine Diesel.

The bloggers are Nayo Barreto (portraying Smith), Kleber Santos (Laurence), and Laudelino Lucas (Chana). Judging by the publications on social networks of Santos and Lucas, they began their “reincarnations” only in 2024, and by that time Barreto had been portraying Smith for several years. For example, back in 2015 he did cosplay in the style character from the film "Men in Black", where the actor played, and in 2020 - him hero from the series "The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air". Judging by Barreto's posts, in the same year he became use programs (in particular, impressions.app) to make your face more similar to the actor.

In the summer of 2024, during the promotional campaign for the film "Bad boys until the end» Smith reposted video with his impersonator and Lawrence double (the actor also plays in the film) and asked: “What should we call these two?” Then about Barreto wrote Brazilian news portal g1. The publication reported that the 30-year-old blogger and entrepreneur lives in the municipality of Kamasari. “Everyone always joked that I looked like Will Smith because of my height, hair and skin color. I really like him, so I took advantage of this resemblance to go to costume parties,” Barreto recalled. During the coronavirus pandemic, he began posting videos using Deepfake technology, and before the release of the new part of the Bad Boys franchise, he decided to find himself partner to imitate the famous duet. Through mutual friends, Barreto met 38-year-old Santos, who became Lawrence's double. Thanks to the success on social networks, a couple of bloggers were invited to a pre-screening of the new film in one of the shopping centers of Salvador, the capital of the state of Bahia. According to Barreto, to do this, they studied the clothes that actors wear at such events, and came in similar outfits.

Then, in a conversation with g1, bloggers said that they dream of meeting their idols, and this happened already in the fall. In September Smith visited Brazil to participate in the Rock in Rio music festival and prepared a surprise for Barreto and Santos, having met with them in a taxi transmission TV presenter Luciano Jaca (back in the summer conceived arrange such a meeting).

In addition, Smith invited Barreto to his performance and called the blogger on stage. Together they filmed several photo And video. “I've wanted to meet this dude since I saw his first video! Thanks for supporting my success in Brazil for me, twin." wrote on social networks Smith.

The latest to start his career as a cyber double was Lucas, who portrays Chan. Judging by the blogger's posts, the first video is published on TikTok in September—just days before his future co-stars met Smith. The video has been watched more than 16 million times, and now more than 1 million people are subscribed to Lucas, so the g1 portal released material and about it. From there it is known that Lucas is 48 years old, he has five children and two grandchildren, he has been living in Kamasari for several years and works as a coconut seller. According to the blogger, they began to call him the nickname Jackie 17 years ago and Lucas’s wife fell in love with it. The man decided to start blogging in June: “When I watched the video of “Will Smith from Bahia” with artificial intelligence, I came up with the idea to make a video based on the scene where Jackie Chan teaches Jaden Smith (Will Smith’s son. - Ed.) to fight in the movie “The Karate Kid.” So I took this story, made a cool video and posted it on social networks.” In the skit, Chan's doppelgänger asked Smith Sr. to repay a debt. Since October, Lucas and Barreto have become lay out joint videos. The blogger joked that Bad Boys has become a trio, so they need a new name, and said that he really wants to meet the real Chan.

Thus, there are three bloggers living in Brazil who met relatively recently to jointly portray three actors: Jackie Chan, Will Smith and Martin Lawrence. The men did not work together in a cargo company, as claimed in viral publications, and their phenomenal similarity with the stars is the result of the use of neural networks.

*Russian authorities think Meta Platforms Inc., which owns the social network Instagram, is an extremist organization; its activities and symbols are prohibited in Russia.

Cover photo: social networks

Mostly not true

What do our verdicts mean?

Read on the topic:

1. Is the video of Jackie Chan and his daughter crying while watching stunts from the actor's old films true?
2. Has Will Smith said he will vote for Trump?
3. Is it true that, according to scientists, every person on Earth has at least six doubles?
4. Is it true that scientists have created a 3D model of the biblical Adam who looks like Vin Diesel?
5. The fictional world of Gek publics (VMGP)