Actor Eric Stonestreet says a planned sitcom featuring him and his Modern Family co-star, Jesse Tyler Ferguson, is unlikely to come to fruition. The two men played gay couple Cam (Stonestreet) and Mitch (Ferguson) in the much-loved show, which ran from 2009 to 2020.
Stonestreet, 53, appeared on the In Depth With Graham Bensinger podcast yesterday. He says that Modern Family’s co-creator, Chris Lloyd, thought that Cam and Mitch could carry a spin-off sitcom. He went as far as to write a pilot. Both actors agreed in principle to reprise their roles.
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However, ABC decided not to run with it.
“I don’t think it’s potential anymore,” Stonestreet told Graham Bensinger. “They had their chance. Chris Lloyd and a couple of the writers wrote a really great script that spun Jesse and I off in our life in Missouri, and they said, ‘No.’ They just said, ‘We don’t want to do it.’”
“I love my character. I love the show.”
At the end of Modern Family, Cam, Mitch and their daughter Lily are poised to move to Missouri after Cam gets a coaching job back in his home state.
“I love my character. I love the show. I love Jesse. We had a great working relationship, we had amazing chemistry. I think Jesse and I maybe felt like they thought of us as the old guys, or something like that, that didn’t seem worthy of keeping those characters going. It felt a little hurtful. But people make business decisions,” added Stonestreet.
The actor, who is straight in real life, still thinks the show would have been a hit.
“I think it would have been a slam dunk,” he said. “I don’t think it would have not been successful. Because you had one of the creators — who had really taken such great care of making sure that show was great for so long — willing to do it,” Stonestreet continued.
“We had the right people in place. It would have been great. If ABC would have said ‘Let’s do it,’ I think we’d be on right now,” he added.
Although the idea of a spinoff show looks dead in the water, Stonestreet still hopes you get to see Cam, Mitch and other cast members again. He said he’d love to see a Christmas special.
The cast did actually reunite for the 30th annual SAG Awards in February. Maybe if a Christmas special does ever happen, it might reawaken studio interest in a spinoff show.
Stonestreet won two Emmy awards for his performance as Cameron Tucker-Pritchett in Modern Family.
Watch Stonestreet’s full interview below.
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