Haile Selassie is in Mussolini 's barber 's chair . America celebrates first of April . This is how America views the predicament of Emperor Haile Selassie of Abyssinia , against whom the tide of war appears to be turning . The picture , a composite , is being published in American newspapers as an April Fool 's Day joke . It shows Mussolini , with unrelenting face , holding a razor over Emperor Haile Selassie , lying at his mercy in the barber 's chair . The Emperor seems aware of his danger . 1 April 1935