The video: Jesse Eisenberg, who plays Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg in The Social Network, was in the middle of his opening monologue as host of "Saturday Night Live" when he was interrupted, first by SNL funnyman Andy Samberg pretending to be Zuckerberg, then by Zuckerberg himself. (View video below.) Zuckerberg's cameo was the first time he and Eisenberg had met (besides the SNL dress rehearsal), and Samberg summed up the meeting as "awkberg" before leaving the two men alone on stage to finish the monologue.
The reaction: The Eisenberg-Zuckerberg meeting was "surprising," says Hadley Freeman in The Guardian. Not only is Zuckerberg famously "publicity-averse," he's also known to hate both The Social Network and Eisenberg's portrayal of him as a "twitchy and cruel nerd." But, says Charlie White in Mashable, maybe that's why the two shared "a seemingly heartfelt hug to show all was forgiven." If the point of the cameo "was to show Zuckerberg's sense of humor," as rumored, "he did an excellent job." I don't know, says Dean Takahashi in VentureBeat. "It wasn't much of a comedy routine," but any "effort that makes Zuckerberg more likable" is probably good for Facebook's eventual public stock offering. Watch the clip:
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