Jesse Eisenberg Shares a “Very Inappropriate” Action from Hosting ‘Saturday Night Live’ in 2011: “I Made a Stupid Mistake”

Jesse Eisenberg had some major misconceptions about the show when he hosted Saturday Night Live back in 2011.

The Social Network star revealed to Jenna Bush Hager and Amy Poehler during a recent appearance on Today With Jenna & Friends that he was under the assumption that he would be pitching and writing sketches for the episode in addition to hosting.

Though he joked that he was told it was “the best episode they ever did” on the show, Eisenberg admitted he only has “bad memories” of that week at SNL.

“I did such a dumb thing,” Eisenberg said on Today. “My dream when I was 17 was to write for SNL. I made a packet and everything and I got an agent. And then, when I got asked to host, which was 10 years later, I assumed I could write all the sketches. I didn’t know how it works. It turns out, they have writers.”

Eisenberg told Poehler and Bush Hager that he “spent the week slipping scripts to different actors” to get his skits on the show, without realizing the show had writers to take care of that.

“I didn’t realize — I’m an idiot — and I was also just wanting to write,” he continued. “I’ve wanted to write my whole life.”

He added, “I didn’t realize that was not the way you do that.”

The actor admitted none of his sketches made it onto the show. “It was so unbelievably inappropriate and offensive of me,” he said.

Poehler tried to make Eisenberg feel better about the experience by noting, “You kind of worked too hard. If you’re gonna go one way, then it’s better to go that way than the other way.”

But Eisenberg didn’t agree. “Not according to the people who wrote the show,” he quipped, causing Poehler and Bush Hager to laugh.

Though Eisenberg’s sketches didn’t make it onto the show, he did star alongside musical guest Nicki Minaj in a “Bride of Blackenstein” sketch and “Spa Talk with Tyla Yonders” with Kristen Wiig, amongst others.

Eisenberg has not returned to host the show since 2011.