For April Fool’s Day in 1994, Joey Skaggs wrote a script and produced a 30 second TV commercial in which he portrayed a psychic attorney called Maqdananda to satirize the proliferation of both New Age psychics and ambulance chasing attorneys. The commercial aired 40 times throughout the last week of March on CNN Headline News in Hawaii.
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In the Fall of 1993, SEXONIX, the world’s first sexual virtual reality company, planned to exhibit their equipment and software at the Metro Toronto Christmas Gift and Invention Show at Sky-Dome. But, the demonstration was not to be. All of the hardware and software, valued at over $300,000, was confiscated at the border by Canadian customs agents on the grounds that SEXONIX was morally offensive to the Canadian people. So said Joseph Skaggs, Ph.D. (a.k.a. Joey Skaggs)…
Read more →In 1993, Joey Skaggs was invited to give a presentation called “The Media: Politics, Power and Persuasion” at the University of Tennessee in Knoxville. When the local NBC TV News called to interview Skaggs before the talk, Skaggs sent Assistant Professor Beauvais Lyons, creator of a collection of mock-archaeology and curator of the Hokes Archives, in his place.
Read more →Joey Skaggs couldn’t pass up the opportunity to hoax the Faith Daniels Show when they sought couples who use sex tapes to appear in a segment called “Sex Tapes — Do They Work?”.
Read more →Father Anthony Joseph (aka Joey Skaggs), a Dominican priest from San Bernadino, pedaled Portofess, a confessional booth mounted on the back of a tricycle, to the Democratic National Convention in New York City in July of 1992.
Read more →On March 24, 1992, an inter-office memo was leaked from Mayor David Dinkins office in New York City announcing a new plan for urban renewal: He was going to sell the Brooklyn Bridge via lottery for $1.00 per ticket. The winner would have the bridge named after them for 5 years at which time another lottery would be held. Funds from the lottery would provide the much needed resources to repair and upgrade the bridge.
Read more →Joey Skaggs was invited to appear on Geraldo’s TV talk show. They also asked him to bring a journalist he had previously hoaxed. The topic was to be media hoaxes. Skaggs instead brought a friend posing as an Associated Press journalist, who said she had been hoaxed by him. Geraldo fell for the hoax hook, line and sinker.
Read more →When “To Tell The Truth”, one of the longest running TV game shows in U.S. history, invited Joey Skaggs to Los Angeles to be a guest, Skaggs could not resist sending his friend Norman Savage in his place. The producers had seen Skaggs’ photo in a recent New York Times article (their inspiration for inviting him), but when Norman arrived at the studio, they never suspected he was not who he said he was.
Read more →In the Fall of 1990, as Dr. Joseph Chenango, a Native American surgeon, Joey Skaggs launched a new permanent cure for baldness–scalp transplants from cadavers. He called it Hair Today, Ltd. Dr. Chenango was soliciting scalp donors with no history of male pattern baldness who worked in high risk occupations, such as electric linesmen or big game hunters. These, he reasoned, would make suitable donors in the event of their untimely death. He was also soliciting new scalp recipients–people wanting to undergo a scalp transplant.
Read more →In the Fall of 1990, Dr. Schlafer (a.k.a. Joey Skaggs) mailed out brochures announcing a new type of vacation experience, one that was enhanced by anesthesiology and subliminal programming. It was called Comacocoon, and offered a solution to the ever increasing risks of traveling away from home as well as the negative impact of tourism on the environment. In actuality, the letter and brochure were sent only to the media.
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