'Amazing' prank Steven Spielberg played on The Goonies director goes viral

Steven Spielberg has been praised by fans for pulling the ‘world’s greatest prank’ – despite the practical joke happening over 35 years ago.

The legendary filmmaker decided to play a joke on director Richard Donner, after the pair worked together on family-friendly flick, The Goonies.

Spielberg even captured Donner’s reaction on camera, with the footage resurfacing nearly four decades later. Have a look for yourself:

In fact, Spielberg only came clean about the joke two years ago when he took part in a Goonies reunion.

Appearing on Josh Gad’s Reunited Apart YouTube channel, the legendary filmmaker revealed to fans that he’d planned the prank after hearing how excited Donner had been to wrap the 1985 adventure film.

Mocking the Goonies director, Spielberg said: “Richard kept saying 'Oh, my God, I got two weeks to go, and I can’t wait to finish and I’m going to go to my house in Hawaii, and I’m gonna get away from all of this noise. It’s extraordinary and I love ’em to pieces, but I can’t stand it anymore'."

Having worked for over a year with child stars, including Sean Astin, Josh Brolin and Jeff Cohen, Donner was eager for some time away from the kids.

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Shortly after filming finished though, Spielberg seized the opportunity to tease his friend by flying the cast and crew out to meet the director whilst he holidayed in Hawaii.

Footage of the epic prank has surfaced online, with Donner clearly in shock when he sees the child stars.

In the short clip, he can be heard yelling: “I don’t believe it! Oh my God! What the hell are you doing here?”

Without missing a beat, the kids begin to tease the director as they disturb his much-needed down-time.

Cohen, who played Chunk in the nostalgic movie, tells him ‘We’re gonna stay with you the whole time we’re here’ with Astin adding: “We’re gonna do a sequel to the movie.”

Since being shared on Twitter earlier this week, the video has gone viral with over 29,000 likes with uploader @Todd_Spence calling the footage ‘amazing’.

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Others have dubbed it ‘one of the best things' on the social media platform, as fans continue to discover the clip online.

An excited user wrote: "This is one of the best things I’ve ever seen on Twitter. Great find," whilst another added: “This warmed my heart. Such a great filmmaker and human being.”

One fan of the legendary filmmaker said that there was no need to look for better prank clips as they wrote: “Well that’s it then. World’s greatest prank. Stop the search.”