KANSAS CITY, Mo. — A Bengals superfan paid tribute to her hometown team, and its quarterback, in a parody song that’s had 80,000 views in less than two weeks.
Erinn Lewis, who grew up in Loveland, a Cincinnati suburb, penned a parody song of Lin-Manuel Miranda’s “We Don’t Talk About Bruno,” from the movie Encanto to “We Don’t Talk About Burrow.”
“I got the idea the Wednesday before the (AFC) championship game,” said Lewis, who now lives in Kansas City.
She was listening to the Encanto soundtrack, “because it’s so catchy,” and with Bengals and Burrow memes and gifs about the Week 17 victory over the Kansas City Chiefs on her mind, she said, “‘You know, I think I can make this work.’”
After writing the song, she approached her husband, Aaron Nordyke, and said, “so, I had an idea.”
Over the next 36 hours, they recorded the various pieces of the video that featured various characters from the Bengals and Chiefs, and representations of other teams. Soon they had a complete music video.
“I didn’t have any expectations,” she said when she posted it on Jan. 28. “I was like, ‘Let’s throw it out there. Maybe people on Bengals Reddit would think it was funny.’”
Facebook helped give her a viral video with friends and friends of friends sharing the video. As of Thursday morning, the video has been viewed more than 82,000 times with more than 1,100 likes.
“I think most of the credit should go to Lin-Manuel Miranda for writing such a catchy song. I just changed the words a little," Lewis said.
So why do the video?
“I grew up in Cincinnati and moved away in 2010 to Kansas City and never stopped loving the Bengals. It was kind of a way I could incorporate the city I live in right now,” said the Ursuline Academy graduate. “I was surprised how many of my Kansas City friends loved it and shared it, too.”
Lewis said she wasn’t trying to be mean to her Kansas City Chiefs friends, but after going to Chiefs playoff watch parties the last few years, she felt it was okay to gloat a little.
While she will “never say never,” on creating another parody video ― she says she has a weird random talent about being really good at writing song parodies ― Lewis said she doesn’t know if she’ll be able to function if the Bengals win the Super Bowl.
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