Even the pre-Mardi Gras season can bring out people’s inner exhibitionist, and this year the cable channel Oxygen caught it all on camera.

Under the guise its hosts were working for the risqué “Girls Gone Wild,” Melissa Howard and Shondrella (yes, that’s her only name)

played pranks on unsuspecting Bourbon Street partygoers for their Candid Camera-like cable show “Girls Behaving Badly.”

“Girls Behaving Badly,” now in its second season on Oxygen, has an all-female cast that plays hidden camera pranks on everyday folk.

Its successful first season played pranks on stars like Cheryl Tiegs, David Alan Grier, Joan and Melissa Rivers, the Chippendale dancers and WNBA players.

The episode filmed in New Orleans will air Friday, April 11 as part of a weeklong “Prank Across America.”

Filming in New Orleans was a homecoming of sorts for host Howard who was a cast member on MTV’s “The Real World: New Orleans.”

“It was kind of a déjà vu feeling being on Bourbon Street with a camera in my face, but not being on ‘The Real World,'” Howard says.

But it was Shondrella who took advantage of standing on Bourbon Street with a camera, getting six men to kiss each other.

Though the men thought they were smooching in the name of the girls’ reciprocity a la “Girls Gone Wild,” Shondrella said they were good sports about being caught on camera, though some asked if they would really gain “Crying Game” fame on national television.

“We had the most fun in New Orleans,” Howard says. “It was great working with Shondrella, she’s hysterical.

“Us standing next to each other is a prank in itself,” says Howard, who is 4 feet 11 inches tall, of 6 foot Shondrella.

Though the pranks are harmless, Shondrella says she might like to play some devious pranks on guys from her school days to “show them I’m tall and sexy now.”

“I was 6 feet in the sixth grade and there’s nothing sexy about that,” she says with a laugh.

But those guys can also see Shondrella on UPN’s Monday night sitcom “One on One,” where she plays Candy, a manicurist who never does any nails but wreaks havoc on the all-male barbershop staff.

Howard can also be seen on MTV’s “Real World/Road Rules Battle of the Sexes.”

Fans can keep up with her by accessing her Web site, PrincessMelissa.com, where she posts commentary from “The Real World” and other musings (this week’s topic: the Oscars and her affinity for Best Actor Adrien Brody).

The site also offers Howard’s original artwork, t-shirts and tote bags.

Though “Girls Behaving Badly” usually airs Sundays at 7 p.m., the New Orleans episode closes the weeklong “Prank Across America” on Friday, April 11 at 6:30 p.m. on Cox Cable channel 349.

For information about the “Rank the Prank” sweepstakes, whose grand-prize winner receives a trip for four to Miami Beach, visit oxygen.com.