Andy Samberg has returned to his Lonely Island musical roots for a new Super Bowl ad with Hellmann's - and his partner in sandwich crime is none other than newly minted Oscar nominee Elle Fanning. "I've been a huge fan of hers for a really long time," Samberg, 47, told Us Weekly exclusively of working with Fanning, 27, on the spot, titled "Sweet Sandwich Time." "I really love that show The Great. I think she was absolutely stellar in that [with] Nicholas Hoult." The Saturday Night Live alum went on to explain how the casting of Fanning - who recently received her first Academy Award nod for her performance in Sentimental Value - came to be. "I had never met her or worked with her before, but her name came across and they were like, 'What do you think about asking Elle? She's having a crazy year.' I was like, 'Are you kidding? Yes! Would she ever do it?' And then she was up for it, and we were so thrilled," Samberg told Us. "She's just lovely. She showed up. She was wonderful to work with. She tried a bunch of different stuff. We did, like, a thousand alts and it ended up being exactly what we planned on doing. But it was so much fun." Hellmann's/Mega He added: "Her Oscar nomination is well deserved. She's having a crazy year. ... She's in so many awesome things, and it's all super well deserved. She's so talented." The Hellmann's ad sees Samberg as "Meal Diamond" - a sandwich-focused parody of Neil Diamond's classic hit "Sweet Caroline." Fanning plays a sandwich lover wooed by Samberg's musical serenade in the middle of a deli, though she doesn't accept his marriage proposal at the end of the commercial. "I obviously love doing comedy and music blended together, and I've sort of been known for a long, long while as someone who really loves sandwiches," Samberg said of why the partnership was a good fit. "One of the most fun parts about it was getting fitted and all those cool '70s duds and the wig and the eyebrows and everything. I obviously did that a lot when I was at SNL, but it was interesting to see myself in a costume that committed again at this age." Samberg starred on Saturday Night Live for seven seasons from 2005 to 2012, where he pioneered the SNL Digital Shorts department alongside his Lonely Island comrades, Jorma Taccone and Akiva Schaffer. (Lonely Island started as a comedy trio in 2001 before reaching widespread acclaim on the hit sketch comedy show.) Meal Diamond is definitely a homage to Samberg's early days of musical sketch comedy. "There's no way to take it other than as flattery," Samberg said of the growth of the SNL Digital Short since his time there. "I went back last year, and they have a huge film division now. ... It's like making a movie in two days. I was just comparing it to how it was when we first started doing them. [For] 'Lazy Sunday' it was four of us, two on camera, one holding the camera, one holding a boom box. That was the whole film unit. It was pretty cool. And eye opening. It made me really happy for everyone that they got to flex such big muscles with that stuff now." 'SNL 50' Red Carpet Arrivals: See What the Stars Wore While music seems to come as naturally to him as comedy, Samberg isn't the only musically inclined one in his family. "It's musical in many ways, and I think the ways in which we are musical are very different, but I think they're both represented well," Samberg told Us of his household, which includes his wife, singer-songwriter Joanna Newsom, and their two children. "Our kids like singing silly songs. Dad's in there." In fact, the odd schedules of a late-night comedian and a musician were part of what bonded the couple in their early days, Samberg says. "[When we were] living in New York, we would go to Blue Ribbon a lot because they were open late," he recalled. "It was a staple for us because she's a musician, and I was at SNL. We'd be up all night and sleeping all day. So we'd be like, 'Hey, it's 1 a.m. should we, like, go get the fried chicken at Blue Ribbon? That was one of our faves."