PSA for Music Fans: If your kids or another family member or friend are trying to tell you that your favorite musician just passed away, be sure to check the news before you go in mourning.
There’s a new trend on TikTok, #fakecelebritydeath (currently with 16 million views), where kids prank their parents by telling them their beloved music stars and other celebrities have passed away and then video the reactions, which is actually quite entertaining. Maybe it’s payback for all those years Jimmy Kimmel had parents who pranked kids and told them they ate all their Halloween candy.
But this twist really takes it to a level. A truly cruel person told her mother that her favorite musician had died. After the panicked mum mis-guessed Keith Richards and then Mick Jagger, her daughter said it was Ozzy Osbourne (it wasn’t it), prompting a prolonged, heartbreaking howl. “I guess my mom never wants me back for Christmas dinner,” the TikToker captioned her post.
When another horrible kid tells her parents Rod Stewart “passes,” the mother just keeps repeating “bullshit” as she gets closer to daughter and films the reaction.
This compilation video captures some of the best fake celebrity death pranks. One parent will literally gasp when their child jokingly tells them that Cher has died. A father jumps out of his chair when he learns Howard Stern is ‘dead’. Another mom has to apologize from a family reunion when she learns of Bon Jovi’s “death,” but the funniest thing has to be the reaction when Dateline host Keith Morrison “passed away” as a mom screamed into a full squat terrible fate collapses.
If you have a few hours during your post-holiday hangover, you can also watch hilarious reactions to the fake death notices of Barry Manilow, Reba McEntire (a popular choice who appears in several pranks), Dave Matthews, Darius Rucker, Paul McCartney and Ice Cube, among many others.