As Impractical Jokers Learned The Hard Way, Identity Theft Is Not A Joke
A normal segment of "Impractical Jokers" involves one of the guys out in public wearing an earpiece where the other guys can tell him to do something ridiculous. A big chunk of the show's humor comes from watching a joker reconcile how they will be perceived with how hilarious it would be to do something. Unfortunately, when dealing with members of the public, not everyone is going to be so happy to be the butt of a joke.
This happened in one particular episode of "Impractical Jokers." In an interview with Celebrity GamerZ, James Murray talked about one bit that never made it to air. Murr elaborated, "Sal was behind the counter [at a grocery store] ringing customers up, and this woman comes up, he's ringing up all her groceries. She goes to pay; she hands Sal her credit card. So I said to him, I was like, 'Sal, very nonchalantly, take out your cell phone and snap a photo of her credit card before you swipe it.'" Suffice it to say, the woman didn't appreciate the prank, and she actually ended up calling the cops on the jokers.
Turns out, the cops were fans of the show
To try to mitigate the damage, the rest of the jokers came out of the hiding area to explain to the woman that she was on a prank show. To make matters worse, apparently this woman had recently been the victim of identity theft, so she was particularly sensitive to this gag. It also didn't help that she had never heard of the show before despite it already being on the air for a few years. There was just no stopping her, and she insisted on calling the police, who arrived at the store about 10 minutes later.
The cops manage to calm the woman down and escort her out of the store. At this point, the guys don't know what to expect. And that's when, amongst the firestorm, they received a blessing. Murr went on to say, "They come back in, they're like, 'Guys...' And we're like, 'Oh man, they're gonna bust us.' Right? They come back in, they're like, 'Guys, listen, we're huge fans of the show. Could we take a photo with you?'" The jokers were ecstatic that the cops weren't going to punish them, and they could resume filming in the store.
The interviewer's naturally curious if this kind of thing is a regular occurrence, and Murr says that kind of thing happens very rarely. It's good to hear most people have a sense of humor, but when dealing with the public, it's inevitable to run into a few unhappy campers.