Will Ferrell and Harper Steele Describe Their Favorite Unaired SNL Collab
The duo appeared on Late Night with Seth Meyers to discuss their new documentary, Will & Harper.
Will Ferrell and Harper Steele have been friends since they both joined Saturday Night Live in 1995 — Ferrell as a cast member and Steele as a writer. Their friendship, which has lasted nearly 30 years, is the subject of a new documentary called Will & Harper, which follows them on a road trip across America.
The duo appeared on Late Night with Seth Meyers on September 24, and since they were being interviewed by another former SNL writer (that would be Meyers, who also briefly appears in the doc), they couldn't help but reminisce about their favorite sketches. Particularly one that never made it to air: "Unicorn Mountain."
"We wrote a sketch called 'Unicorn Mountain,' but the way we wrote — because we did this a few times, by the way — it never worked," Steele told Meyers of their experimental collaboration style. "I would write half and then hand it to Will, and then he would write the second half. And then we would just reveal what we did at the read-through."
"So Will wrote a incredibly long five-page kids' show introduction to something called 'Unicorn Mountain.' It was, the unicorns are free and they're friendly and they love everyone," Steele continued. "Then my half, we open on Unicorn Mountain, and Tracy Morgan and Will are eating a unicorn. Talking about how easy it was to catch them. Their faces were so sweet. They had no idea."
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Will Ferrell & Harper Steele pitch their SNL sketch idea for Second Chance Theatre
"Think about that," Steele added, suggesting it get a second life on Late Night's "Second Chance Theatre," the recurring segment that gives SNL alums the chance to stage a sketch they'd written for the show that never made it to air.
"Oh, look, I'm on board for "Unicorn Mountain," Meyers said gamely.
"You got to find that five-minute song," joked Steele, as the Late Night Host replied, "We'll dig it up out of the archives."
Ferrell and Steele have been friends for almost 30 years, and three years ago, Steele came out to Ferrell as a trans woman. This news, and Steele's love for road trips, inspired the two to make their Will & Harper documentary.
"If you know Harper, you know she loves a good cross-country road trip," Ferrell told Meyers. "But she was lamenting the fact that now, as a trans woman, some of the places I wouldn't even think twice about going into, the off-the-road honky tonk bar or this place, that now she wondered, 'Is that still safe for me?'"
"And I thought, 'Well, I got this crazy idea... what if we take a road trip and I can kind of be your buffer into these places? At the same time, I can educate myself, ask you all these questions I have on what it means to be trans,'" he continued, jokingly adding, "So it'll show that I'm a great person."
Watch Will Ferrell and Harper Steele's interview above, and watch Late Night with Seth Meyers weeknights at 12:35/11:35c, streaming next day on Peacock.
