The Drama Between Elon Musk & SNL's Chloe Fineman

"Saturday Night Live" has had its fair share of controversial hosts — this is the show that invited on Donald Trump in 2004 and 2015, after all — and some of them are as unpleasant behind the scenes as you would expect. Elon Musk hosted an episode in 2021 and the "SNL" cast was none too pleased about it, with many not enjoying the experience. Cast member Chloe Fineman took to TikTok to express just how terrible Musk was to the "SNL" cast and crew, saying he made her very upset.

"OK, I just saw some news article about Elon Musk being like butt-hurt about 'SNL' and his impression, but, you're clearly watching the show. What are you talking about? And you know what? I'm gonna come out and say at long last that I'm the cast member that he made cry. And he's the host that made someone cry. Maybe there's others," she said in the now-deleted TikTok video (via Variety). Her comments come after fellow "SNL" cast member Bowen Yang told Andy Cohen on an episode of "Watch What Happens Live With Andy Cohen" that a host, whom he did not name, " ... made multiple cast members cry on Wednesday during the, before the table-read, because he hated the ideas."

Originally, Chloe Fineman wasn't going to expose Elon Musk, but his criticisms of "Saturday Night Live" forced her hand. "You made [me], Chloe Fineman, burst into tears because I stayed up all night writing the sketch," she said in the deleted TikTok video. The "Big Mouth" actor said Musk bluntly told her it wasn't funny. She continued, "Then you started pawing through my script, flipping each page, being, like, 'I didn't laugh once, not one time.'" While Fineman didn't explicitly name which sketch Musk took issue with, she did say it made it on the episode. She concluded her rant against Musk gracefully, saying, "I thought you were really funny in it. But, have a little manners here, sir."

Musk owns X, formerly Twitter, and he took to his social media platform to respond to Fineman's accusations. "Frankly, it was only on the Thursday before the Saturday that ANY of the sketches generated laughs. I was worried," Musk tweeted. "I was like damn my 'SNL' appearance is going to be so f**king unfunny that it will make a crackhead sober!! But then it worked out in the end." And work out it did as Musk's 2021 episode was the highest-rated episode over a three-year period, until Ariana Grande hosted on October 12, 2024 (via Variety).

Much like the tantrum-throwing President-elect Donald Trump, Musk has been a vocal critic of "SNL," especially after the 2024 presidential election. "'SNL' has been dying slowly for years," he said in a tweet after the show's first post-election episode aired. He also tweeted, "They are so mad that [Donald Trump] won," with two crying laughing emojis.