When actor Will Farrell and Harper Steele—a former head writer at Saturday Night Live—decided to film their cross-country road trip documentary Will & Harper, it came after months of discussing whether or not they wanted to open up about their personal lives on camera.
Steele, who publicly came out as a transgender woman in 2021, held some reservations about the documentary in the beginning.
“The ultimate selling point, I don’t want to sound like a politician or altruistic, but there were a lot of trans bills, a lot of legislation being introduced, legislation across every state, across the country and it’s still looking a little restrictive and maybe a little dire for trans people,” Steele was quoted as telling The Hollywood Reporter at the film’s L.A. premiere. “I don’t know if this movie is going to change hearts and minds, but you have to try to do something with your life and we felt like this might be useful.”
The two have been friends for 30 years after starting at SNL during the same week. Three years ago, Steele wrote an email to Ferrell stating that she was transitioning to live as a woman. She had been taking road trips most of her adult life, so the friends decided to take a 16-day trip from New York to L.A. to process this new part of their friendship.
Director Josh Greenbaum has said that “Harper loves to do these cross-country road trips, she’s done hundreds of them, and since she had transitioned she hadn’t done any.”
He then added, “Will realized that and she was kind of lamenting the fact that she wasn’t sure if she felt safe, so the idea really started there because Will said, ‘Why don’t I fly to New York and I’ll be by your side for your first cross-country road trip as Harper.’”
The documentary has made stops at Sundance, Telluride, and TIFF over the course of this year, and has picked up much acclaim along the way. The reaction from the trans community in particular, Will Ferrel said, has “blown us away.”
“We’re a little overwhelmed,” Ferrel said. “In our hearts we’re self-loathing comedians, so to have this thing actually work on so many levels and be so funny and have people that we love and like and respect like it so much, it’s been incredible.”
Regarding its possible impact on the comedy community, which has not typically been accepting of trans people in the past, Steele said, “You can’t control the comedy community … it’s always going to be a free for all and it’s always going to battle itself out, it has from the very beginning.”
Greenbaum added, “Comedy is a reflection of culture, and culture changes. So it may take a minute for comedy to catch up, but it will.”
In releasing at this time politically, Greenbaum has stated that he hopes the film takes issues that trans people face “out of the political conversation in a lot of ways because it’s such a human story; it’s a personal story of two friends and I think part of the issue is so many people don’t know trans people. They say 70 percent or something don’t know a trans person, so what they get information-wise comes from politicians or the media. Instead of letting those outlets control the story and the narrative, let’s let ourselves tell these stories.”
He continued by saying, “If you don’t know a trans person and you watch this film, now you’ll know Harper and she’s the best.”
Will & Harper will begin streaming on Netflix on Sept. 27.
