Hey, pranksters. Do you love pulling off a good one? Maybe you're a fan of the classics, short-sheeting the bed, saran wrap on the toilet bowl, salt instead of sugar in the homemade cake. Are you one of these people who cooks up elaborate April full stunts that somehow end up being not only successful but actually

hilarious? Not me. Even if I could dream up an amazing prank, I don't have the kind of poker

face to pull it off. Plus, I always worry about backfires because even a seemingly harmless

prank can go really wrong.

If you're lucky, the worst that happens is a little embarrassment or maybe some hurt feelings.

But if you're unlucky, terribly unlucky, that prank can end up in bloodshed in murder.

And they got a small beam of light against the mirror.

True, weird, weird weird stuff.

Credit for one of the most famous April Fool's Day pranks ever goes to possibly the least ziny, least madcap, least reckless company you can think of.

The BBC.

Yep.

The BBC, that august, sober, paragon of television virtue, et cetera, et cetera, the world's

oldest national broadcaster, and possibly the world's largest employer of broadcast and television

pros. Today, the BBC, like all media, is under near constant fire for what they report and how

for programming choices, casting decisions, budgets, profits, biases, and blind spots.

Today, reality itself feels so fractured and warped and peculiar that any major broadcaster

would have a super hard time pranking their jaded audience.

Once upon a time, the U.S. military shooting down a Chinese spy balloon over Myrtle Beach

would have been the plot of a slapstick comedy.

Not a breaking news story just two months ago,

but April 1st, 1957, that was a different time. You've probably at least heard of the

venerable documentary program, Panorama. It's been on the air for over 70 years now. It's the longest

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