The Muppet Parody of ‘When Harry Met Sally’ Was Way Too Sexual for the Muppets

Boldly betting that society as a whole hasn’t turned against the concept of reuniting the stars of an old movie for an artistically-bankrupt Super Bowl commercial, Billy Crystal and Meg Ryan just recreated the most famous scene from When Harry Met Sally, this time, in the name of selling mayonnaise.

Of course, they made sure to tease the “iconic” reunion on social media first, thereby ensuring that fans would inevitably be disappointed and enraged by the 60-second Hellman’s ad. 

The commercial finds Meg Ryan and Billy Crystal (who seemingly found his missing sweater) once again dining at Katz’s Delicatessen. This time, instead of making a point about how men can’t tell when women fake orgasms, Ryan seems genuinely aroused by her sandwich? That’s weird. 

“This one’s real,” Crystal notes, later adding, “I’m competing with a condiment.” Oh, and Sydney Sweeney is there for some reason, delivering the famous “I’ll have what she’s having” line.

While you might assume that this was the strangest When Harry Met Sally recreation to star Crystal, you’d be wrong. 

Back in 1996, Crystal appeared on Muppets Tonight, the short-lived, occasionally controversial, Muppet Show reboot. Early on in the episode, Crystal introduces a clip of “a very rare screen test” from When Harry Met Sally, featuring another actress auditioning for the part of Sally. And that actress just so happened to be Miss Piggy.

In the Muppet version, Crystal tells Miss Piggy that his date canceled on him because she had a cold, prompting Piggy to suggest that she may have faked the sneeze, arguing that  “most women at one time or another have faked a sneeze to get out of a date.” When Crystal points out that he can tell the difference between real sneeze and a fake sneeze, Piggy decides to prove him wrong.

The iconic puppet character then imitates Ryan’s performative moaning for over a half a minute. Sure, it’s technically in the service of one big sneeze, but this is still arguably the most bizarrely sexual scene in the entire Muppet canon. It’s literally 30 seconds of Kermit the Frog’s girlfriend making fiercely orgasmic noises for a show that was eventually rerun on the Disney Channel. 

The sketch ends with another diner telling their server, “I’ll have what she’s having, only less pepper.”

When a fan shared the video on Reddit, other users were understandably nonplussed. “Some of those noises were, uh… Pretty intense,” one person wrote. “Anyone else unsettled by Miss Piggy having an orgasm?” another post read. 

Perhaps Statler and Waldorf put it best — immediately after the When Harry Met Sally sketch, Statler says to his pal, “There’s a lot to be said for this program.” 

To which Waldorf replies, “Too bad you can’t say it on a family show.”