--- title: Sir Ian McKellen Teaches Cookie Monster to Resist on Sesame Street description: Specifically, how to resist delicious cookies canonical: https://time.com/3638457/sir-ian-mckellen-cookie-monster-sesame-street/ author: Samantha Grossman article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2014-12-17T19:37:15.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-04-13T07:15:25.709Z og:title: Watch Sir Ian McKellen Teach Cookie Monster About Self-Control og:description: Specifically, how to resist delicious cookies og:url: https://time.com/3638457/sir-ian-mckellen-cookie-monster-sesame-street/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt8375d6b4781a3a0e/69876f7c8e0601582845949c/screen-shot-2014-12-17-at-2-01-25-pm.png?branch=production&width=826&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 og:image:width: 826 og:image:height: 465 og:image:alt: Screen Shot 2014-12-17 at 2.01.25 PM og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: Watch Sir Ian McKellen Teach Cookie Monster About Self-Control twitter:description: Specifically, how to resist delicious cookies twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt8375d6b4781a3a0e/69876f7c8e0601582845949c/screen-shot-2014-12-17-at-2-01-25-pm.png?branch=production&width=826&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  # Watch Sir Ian McKellen Teach Cookie Monster About Self-Control > Sponsored content. 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The Brief is available free at time.com/newsletters, where readers can select it along with any of TIME's other six newsletters. There is no subscription required to receive it. #### Is The Brief free? Yes. The Brief is a free daily email newsletter from TIME. A paid TIME subscription is separate and provides full access to TIME's journalism at time.com/subscribe-agent. #### Who writes The Brief? The Brief is led by editor Richard Hall and draws on reporting from TIME's newsroom. Every edition is assembled by TIME editors rather than generated automatically. by [Samantha Grossman](https://time.com/author/samantha-grossman/) ## Samantha Grossman Dec 17, 2014 7:37 PM UTC  by [Samantha Grossman](https://time.com/author/samantha-grossman/) ## Samantha Grossman Dec 17, 2014 7:37 PM UTC Back in October, we were lucky enough to see Ice Cube [perform magic tricks](http://time.com/3546255/ice-cube-magic-tricks-sesame-street/) on _Sesame Street_. Now, we get to see another, older, more British celeb make an appearance on the show. This time, it’s Sir Ian McKellen. The _Lord of the Rings_ actor has graciously arrived at _Sesame Street_ to teach Cookie Monster a new word: “resist.” He starts with a simple definition: “The word resist means to control yourself and stop yourself from doing something you really want to do.” McKellen uses a few examples that Cookie Monster does not relate to — until, of course, the actor busts out a cookie and forces Cookie Monster to resist it. Or at least, _try_ to resist it. _Read next:_ [_5 Things You Didn’t Know About the Early (Sunny) Days of Sesame Street_](http://time.com/3563830/sesame-street-trivia/?xid=time%5Freadnext) ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/3638457/sir-ian-mckellen-cookie-monster-sesame-street/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/3638457/sir-ian-mckellen-cookie-monster-sesame-street/"},"headline":"Watch Sir Ian McKellen Teach Cookie Monster About Self-Control","datePublished":"2014-12-17T19:37:15.000Z","dateModified":"2026-04-13T07:15:25.709Z","description":"Specifically, how to resist delicious cookies","url":"https://time.com/3638457/sir-ian-mckellen-cookie-monster-sesame-street/","keywords":["Newsfeed","Sesame Street","celebrity"],"thumbnailUrl":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt8375d6b4781a3a0e/69876f7c8e0601582845949c/screen-shot-2014-12-17-at-2-01-25-pm.png?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"Samantha Grossman","jobTitle":null,"url":"https://time.com/author/samantha-grossman/"}],"articleSection":"","image":[{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt8375d6b4781a3a0e/69876f7c8e0601582845949c/screen-shot-2014-12-17-at-2-01-25-pm.png?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","width":1200,"height":675,"headline":"Screen Shot 2014-12-17 at 2.01.25 PM","caption":"","creditText":"","representativeOfPage":true}],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Time","url":"https://time.com/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://time.com/images/logo.png","width":528,"height":156},"foundingDate":"March 3, 1923","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/time","https://www.instagram.com/time/?hl=en","https://twitter.com/time","https://www.pinterest.com/timemagazine"]}},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@id":"/tag/time-section-newsfeed/","name":"Newsfeed"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/3638457/sir-ian-mckellen-cookie-monster-sesame-street/","name":"Watch Sir Ian McKellen Teach Cookie Monster About Self-Control"}}]}] ```