According to NBC, Saturday Night Live posted a video on October 26 in which Season 52 cast members Mikey Day, Sarah Sherman, Ashley Padilla and Kenan Thompson held a fake writers' session with Elmo, Grover, Cookie Monster and Oscar the Grouch.

Day frames it as a brainstorm for a big show with 'new writers joining us,' and the Muppets pitch their takes on famous SNL sketches rather than new material.

Nerdist frames the moment as SNL effectively hiring the Sesame Street crew as sketch comedy writers, complete with the characters misunderstanding what 'sketch' means.

The clip's centerpiece, as both NBC and Nerdist describe it, is Elmo donning a suit and delivering a pitch-perfect Lorne Michaels impression: 'Well, you know, it's the first time we were all together — Paul and Paul and Snuffleupagus.'

Nerdist calls that line possibly the greatest joke in either show's history.

NBC reports Cookie Monster channels Chris Farley's Matt Foley in a cheap suit — 'a lot of cookie eating when you're living in a van down by the river!' — before collapsing onto the table, while Yahoo credits puppeteer Ryan Dillon's skillful voicework for selling the impression.

Yahoo argues nobody saw the impression coming, noting fans on X reacted with disbelief — 'That Lorne impression has no right being so good' — and jokes about Elmo hosting or Lorne never recovering.

The parody is dense with deep-cut references: NBC details Oscar the Grouch stumbling into a Debbie Downer bit with the sad trombone and zoom-in, Elmo nixing Rocco jokes right as Padilla arrives dressed as Zoe's pet rock, and an 'Elmingo' riff on Marcello Hernández's Domingo.

Nerdist adds that Sarah Sherman built a Three-Headed Monster bit with the Two-Headed Monster.

NBC reports Ashley Padilla reprised her Season 51 'Haircut' sketch from the 2025 Glen Powell-hosted episode, this time bonding with Grover over fancy new 'dos. When Day asked if they were pitching another terrible haircut sketch, Padilla and Grover whipped around to protest, 'What do you mean?

We went to the salon at lunch!' The segment ends with every Muppet — and Kenan Thompson — dozing off before airtime because, as Sherman explains, it's past their bedtime, while Cookie Monster mumbles 'Live from New York, it's Snack-urday night.'

Nerdist hopes the Sesame Street denizens stick around Studio 8H long enough for a dinner sketch with Lorne, Elmo, Paul, Paul and Snuffleupagus, while Yahoo wants a follow-up where Elmo does the impression to Michaels' face.

The affection ran both ways: NBC notes Sherman confessed on Instagram that she cried when she met the Muppets.

The crossover rides a bigger moment for NBC, which is marking 100 years since its first broadcast on November 15, 1926, and for SNL's Season 52, whose next stop is Inde Navarrette hosting the October 31 Halloween episode.