Just last week, Elton John posted a photo to his Instagram account of Russian President Vladimir Putin and thanked the world leader for calling him and agreeing to meet and discuss gay rights in Russia. As it turns out, Putin’s phone call was a prank arranged by two well-known Russian celebrity pranksters, Vladimir Krasnov and Alexey Stolyarov. Pranks are supposed to be funny; this one, however, was not. So the real Putin decided to counter Krasnov and Stolyarov’s trickery by calling John to apologize for the prank, according to ABC News. Putin also said that if schedules permit, he would be willing to meet with John in the future.