He takes on an unusual role in Will Ferrell’s new Netflix film.

From Robert Goulet to Ron Burgundy, Will Ferrell has managed to embody a particularly goofy brand of American masculinity, sending up and serenading lovable idiots who don’t realize their time has passed. And sometimes he did it with the help of Harper Steele, a former head writer at Saturday Night Live who came out as a trans woman during the pandemic. Ferrell, who started at SNL the same week as Steele in 1995, has long considered her one of his closest friends. But no one was sure how Steele’s announcement would affect their relationship. This is also the case in Josh Greenbaum’s documentary Will & HarperThe two embark on a cross-country road trip and use their hours behind the wheel to develop a new understanding of who they are to each other, testing it at stops along the way.

Harper, who, as she now puts it, previously “performed as a character named Andrew,” has a lifelong passion for traveling across the country, stopping in pubs and diners and staying in cheap motels. But she’s not sure the places where she once felt most at home will welcome her newly visible self. While she wouldn’t have thought twice about walking down a dark alley as a man, she “learns to be a little more afraid of things like that.” The course she plans with Ferrell takes them from New York City to Los Angeles, with a stop in her hometown of Iowa City, and is based heavily on stereotypical American settings: a dive bar in rural Oklahoma, a Texas steakhouse where the 72nd One-ounce steaks are served free. The cut is free if you can eat it in less than an hour. Steele wants to know if she still fits in these places that gave her — a person whose core personality Ferrell describes as “born and raised in Iowa, 501 jeans, shitty beer” — so much joy, and if she even feels that way anymore will be safe. Do American institutions have a place for them? And in how many of these institutions have transgender people already found their place, whether the people around them know it or not? Finally, Saturday Night Live had a trans author on the team in the mid-90s. She just hadn’t come out yet.

Ferrell’s celebrity forms a penumbra around them wherever they go, attracting goodwill – and attention, not just good. He’s used to being recognized, so much so that on the rare occasions his name elicits a blank stare, he’ll crack a joke on camera, but he realizes he’s never faced that kind of scrutiny felt what happens to a visibly transsexual woman in the depths – red crowd. “As many times as I’ve sat in a goldfish bowl in my life,” he tells Steele, “this beats it all.” When Steele takes her first tentative steps into a street bar in Meeker, Oklahoma, she leaves Ferrell on it Parking lot back to see what it feels like to do it alone. But she keeps her phone handy so she can call him any time she needs support.

As it turns out, the patrons of the Full Moon Saloon are perfectly hospitable to Steele—or at least as hospitable as they would be to any New Yorker with a camera crew—despite the menacing cutout of a “Fuck Biden” flag she walks through the door. (Left unnoticed is the fact that, even when she’s waiting outside, Ferrell is never truly alone.) At a nearby auto racing track, a man with a young daughter clearly demands, “Don’t be afraid. If you enjoy it, come out.” Although there are more islands of open-mindedness than some might expect, Will & Harper Don’t idealize the heartland, pointing out that some of the people who seem to tolerate Steele, at least personally, behave very differently when they don’t have to look a trans person in the eyes. At a Pacers game, she and Ferrell shake hands with Indiana Gov. Eric Holcomb, only to find out in the car that he supports a bill banning gender-specific care for minors and other anti-LGBTQ+ laws. They emerge from this Texas steakhouse unscathed, but when the video of Ferrell’s heroic meat-eating goes viral, the internet is flooded with transphobic reactions. There may not be any conscious hostility evident in the Denny’s waitress who addresses the couple as “gentlemen,” but one can see how Ferrell learns over the course of the trip, stepping in to correct misunderstandings and seizing opportunities to correct them to prevent in advance.

No road trip in Will Ferrell’s company can pass for mundane, but he works to present himself as an avatar of cis-male ordinariness, a loyal and generous friend who nonetheless has many questions: When did you know? Do you still want to have sex? And how do you like your new breasts? Watch sometimes Will & Harper feels a little like being led by the hand, even though you feel like you’re ready to go alone. But the film’s intentions are pure, and one gets the feeling that many of the people Ferrell and Steele meet on their journey could benefit from a beginner’s course. Ferrell may be one of the country’s bigger stars, but he’s also the kind of guy who sits in a Walmart parking lot with an old friend, eating Pringles and sipping a Natty Light. (At times, the film’s penchant for showcasing brand logos is reminiscent of the film’s product placement gags Talladega Nights(but if Dunkin’ Donuts wants to lend its name to the story of a middle-aged trans woman, all the better.) It’s as wholesome and American as it gets.