Turns out, it helps having Will Ferrell around to shift others’ prejudice into (temporary) tolerance.
Ferrell and Harper Steele, the subjects of Netflix’s new road trip documentary “Will & Harper,” swung by “Late Night With Seth Meyers” Tuesday to discuss the project. And Steele — Ferrell’s longtime collaborator and former head writer of “Saturday Night Live” who came out as trans during the COVID pandemic lockdown — recalled meeting Indiana’s anti-trans Gov. Eric Holcomb, who was eager for a photo opp with her friend while at a Pacers basketball game.
“I will say when you walk into a bar or basketball game with Will Ferrell, people tend to want to be kind,” Steele began. “We have an uncomfortable moment with the governor of Indiana, who is not very kind of trans people, but he needed to take a picture with Will so bad that he dropped all of his principles. And that to me is what Will does for me.”
Steele added, however, that it’s politicians like Holcomb who polarize Americans against one another, but that her experience while filming the documentary, out Friday, is that “the resting place for people is generally kindness. I think we found that across the country.”
“In general, I do believe people want to be kind and it’s just the news and the press and the politicians that are polarizing us. So yeah, that’s how I feel,” Steele said.
Watch the full interview segment below:
“Will & Harper” was a hit out of the Sundance Film Festival and was acquired by Netflix in February. It documents a cross-country roadtrip with Ferrell and Steele, which ultimately serves as an opportunity for the decades-old friends to reacquaint with one another following Steele’s transition and sets the stage for Steele to come into her own while meeting people and doing things from coast to coast.
“It’s a movie about the power of friendship and acceptance, that we hope can help shift the culture,” director Josh Greenbaum said in a statement at the time of its Netflix acquisition.
Gov. Holcomb has held office as Indiana’s governor since 2017 and has become a prominent figure in anti-trans legislation. He was widely condemned by LGBTQ+ advocacy groups, including the Human Rights Campaign, in 2023 for signing a discriminatory gender-affirming care ban into law.
Watch Steele and Ferrell’s “Late Night” interview in the video above.
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