Just Kidding, Folks!

By DAVID ELLIS

April really brought out the practical jokers this year, and not just on the first day. Hoaxes, fakes and phonies kept cropping up all month long:

The Great Pretender. London's respected Independent newspaper reported April 1 that Arthur Wynd, a farmer claiming to be the illegitimate son of Edward VIII's "forgotten" twin brother, was challenging Queen Elizabeth II's right to be monarch. As outrage grew over the prospect of a royal DNA test, the paper admitted that it had made up the whole thing.

Murder, They Said. Three disk jockeys at Los Angeles radio station KROQ admitted that they had faked an on-air murder confession last June in a bid to boost ratings. The deejays watched police conduct a fruitless 10-month investigation before fessing up. Their minor penalty: a week off the air.

Eye It Carefully. A press release from "CBS News" trumpeted a 60 Minutes investigation: Japanese conglomerates now have the technology to duplicate U.S. currency and produce credit cards that allow "unlimited charges without having to pay the resulting bill." A network spokesman called the fake release the product of a "warped mind."

A Boy Named Oprah. Jecquin Stitt triumphed in a Ladies' Home Journal Oprah Winfrey look-alike contest and won an invitation to appear on the celebrity's talk show next week. Embarrassed editors later discovered Stitt was a man (albeit one undergoing a sex-change procedure) but didn't revoke the prize.

Creative Writing. The manuscript for Derek Goodwin's first novel, Just Killing Time, was sent to publishers adorned with endorsements by John le Carre and Joseph Wambaugh. Simon & Schuster was willing to pay $920,000 for the thriller but found out the blurbs had been faked and withdrew its offer. Goodwin insists the bogus testimonials are the work of an unidentified enemy.

Staying in Congress. Cicciolina, the porn star elected to the Italian Parliament in 1987, surprised fellow lawmakers by quitting office. Although her letter of resignation acknowledged she was an "unwelcome presence" in the legislature, Cicciolina was only pulling a pesce d'Aprile, an April fish tale.

With reporting by Georgia Harbison