Whassup?

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This article focuses primarily on an advertisement campaign. For details about the phrase itself, see What's up.

Whassup? Just Chillin' Havin' A BUD Watching the Game!! was a catch phrase used in a TV/radio commercial campaign for Anheuser-Busch Budweiser beer in the early 2000s. The ad campaign became wildly popular all over the world, and a full blown pop culture phenomenon. The phrase itself is an alteration of the phrase "What's up?".

The commercials were based on a short film written & directed by Charles Stone III, that featured Philadelphia native Stone and his childhood friends Fred Thomas, Paul Williams and Scott Brooks. The short film, entitled "True", portrayed Stone and his friends sitting around talking on the phone and saying "Whassup!" to one another in a comical way. The short was the hit of many film festivals and eventually caught the attention of Vinny Warren, a creative director at the Chicago based ad agency DDB, who took the idea to August A. Busch IV, vice president of Anheuser-Busch, and signed Stone to direct Budweiser TV commercials based on the film. "Whassup!" went on to become one of the most award winning TV campaigns in history (winning the Cannes Grand Prix award and a Clio award, among others). And on May 16th 2006, the campaign was inducted into the CLIO Hall of Fame.

The popularity of the ad campaign skyrocketed later on in the 2000s when various independently produced parodies began appearing on the Internet (featuring the SuperFriends, The Simpsons created by Giovanni Barone, South Park, the Teletubbies, Rabbis, Grannies, and many others mimicking the commercials), resulting in it becoming an Internet phenomenon. In addition, many popular television shows such as Saturday Night Live and ESPN's SportsCenter did their own parodies of the commercials. The commercial was also parodied in the 2000 hit spoof Scary Movie by Marlon Wayans and other cast members. Charles, Scott, Paul and Fred also made guest appearances on many television shows, including The Oprah Winfrey Show, the Tonight Show with Jay Leno, Live With Regis & Kathy Lee, The Howard Stern Show, Entertainment Tonight, the Today Show, CBS This Morning, 48 Hours, and Inside Edition.

Budweiser would later do their own parodies of the ads with "yuppies" saying; "What are you doing?", and "New Jersey-ites" saying; "How ya' doin'?" The catch phrase and the commercials have been parodied worldwide, often using colloquialisms that appeal to a regional audience. For example, a parody of Yorkshire men used the phrase "Ey up!", Scotsmen used the phrase "How's about ye'?" and Japanese men used the phrase "Ah so!"

Dance songs with the sole purpose of featuring the phrase were created, and resulted in chart success. These include "Whazzup" by True Party in 2000 (#13 on the UK Singles Chart), and "Wassup" by Da Muttz (a nom de plume of producers Alex Rizzo and Elliot Ireland) in the same year (#11 in the UK, #12 on Australian ARIAnet singles chart).

Pro-wrestling tag-team the Dudley Boyz adopted it into part of one of their signature moves whilst working as faces. One member slams the opponent to the ground, and the other member climbs to the top rope, upon which, both men look at each other and proclaim "Whazzup!" before finishing the move

Charles Stone III has since gone on to a successful Hollywood career, directing several feature films, including Paid in Full, Drumline, and Mr. 3000.

From 2000 to 2001, Scott, Paul and Fred hosted ABC's "Best Commercials You've Never Seen", then from 2001 to 2002 Scott took over as the solo host. Scott has also gone on to a successful acting career, with guest roles on TV shows such as "Hack" and "Jonny Zero", being featured in "Mr. 3000", and the 2005 television commercial Dr. Scholl's "Are you Gellin'?" (as of 2005).