Modern Family was a "modern" sitcom because it included multiple family
structures without showing one as better than another. They included two gay men with a baby,
a traditional nuclear family, and a father with a trophy wife and son.
The characters were endearing enough to keep the series running for 11 seasons.
They overcame every challenge with love and understanding.
Even superfans may not know the struggles the cast overcame behind the scenes. Their
families and relationships were not always healthy, and neither were their bodies.
Keep watching to learn about the secrets & scandals behind the scenes of Modern Family.
Britney Spears Missed Her Chance to Be on the Show
One of the world’s biggest pop stars was also a major Modern Family fan.
She expressed an interest in appearing on it. The
producers were for it and sent her crew an agreement to set everything in motion.
The problem was that they took too long to respond. The showrunners
decided that the only thing to do was to drop any storylines they’d planned to include her in.
No Kiss and Potential Homophobia
Eric Stonestreet and Jesse Tyler Ferguson play Mitchell and Cam,
a gay couple who adopt a daughter named Lily. They were praised for being fully-fledged characters,
but fans hated the fact that they never got to kiss onscreen. They even sent out multiple
Facebook petitions to let them lock lips. The writers eventually listened by season two.
Ed O'Neil, who plays their father, Jay, heard about the commotion and came under fire for his
response in 2010. He found it "half amusing, half annoying." He said that fans should use
their imaginations about what the couple was doing behind the scenes to keep it from turning
into something potentially too controversial for television. He also noted that Jay and his wife
Gloria don't engage in many displays of affection onscreen. He received massive backlash online.
This wasn’t the first time Ed had exhibited such behavior. He
played the super-conservative Al Bundy in Married With Children. In an interview,
he admitted that he had problems with his lesbian co-star Amanda Bearse. He got disinvited to her
wedding because she knew he’d laugh watching two women walk down the aisle together.
Latina Stereotyping
LGBTQ individuals weren't the only ones that Modern Family was criticized for
representing in an off-putting manner. The character of Gloria, Jay's wife,
was considered by many to be a stereotype. They felt she was nothing more than a Latina
trophy wife and didn't appreciate the frequent references to her clothes,
accent, and illegal businesses in her home country of Columbia.
One joke in particular got her in hot water. Jay tells her that something she did wasn’t okay,
and she gets upset. She mentions the problems
in Columbia but says that at least they’re not Peruvians.
Milagros Lizarrage of Peru USA and Beatriz Merino of the country’s People Denfender’s Office didn’t
think it was funny. She and the creators of the show stood by it. They felt that it was making
fun of her for sounding insensitive while calling out another character for doing the same thing.
Before Ty Burell Made it Big
Only super fans of this actor may know what his life was like before Modern
Family. He was homeless after graduating from college in Pennsylvania. He’d get
jobs that only paid $200 a week and had to move around because the police would
find him when he lived in his van. He showered in the gym and ate at hotels.
ABC didn’t want to hire him at first. They didn’t think he was funny or
edgy enough for the role of Phil Dunphy. Showrunner Steve Levitan appreciated the
charmingly awkward energy he brought to the character, and the rest was history.
Ariel Winter’s Real Family
All the families on Modern Family are relatively stable and come back together
after a fight. That must have been a wonderful escape for Ariel Winter who played Alex Dunphy.
Her life at home was full of physical and emotional abuse. She filed for emancipation
for her mother Shanelle Grey at the age of 17. Intense court battles raged over money,
and she eventually got tens of thousands of residual checks returned. She was placed in the
care of her sister and still speaks to her father even though that relationship is also complicated.
Internet Trolls
Ariel unfortunately had to deal with bullying and abuse over the
internet as well. They’ve sexualized and criticized her body since she started on
the show as a teenager. Many of the comments focused on her breast reduction procedure.
Fortunately, Ariel knows how to respond to these trolls. She’s used her fame to
give them snappy retorts and speak out against online bullying and body-shaming.
Sarah’s Ex
Sarah Hyland, who played Hayley Dunphy, had a dangerous relationship. It didn’t
seem that way at first. Her boyfriend Matthew Pokop even appeared on an episode of the show.
That was until he began to become abusive. He’d send threatening and disturbing texts
after they broke up and choked her. He even threatened her beloved dog, Bixby.
After they split, she had to file a restraining order against him. It was granted on October 6,
2014. He was ordered to stay 100 yards away from her and her dog at
all times and not own a gun or ammunition. Julie Bowen, who played Claire Dunphy,
helped support her throughout the process. She said she “didn’t do anything special” but felt
it was the right thing to do. Sophia’s Embryos
Another broken relationship on Modern Family led to equally horrible but stranger issues.
Sofia was engaged to Nick Loeb but broke it off in 2014. They’d planned to have children,
visited a fertility specialist, and gotten two fertilized eggs frozen. They’d even
signed a contract that both of them had to agree to before they could be implanted.
Nick sued for the right to implant those embryos into a surrogate. She wanted them
to remain frozen. A judge ruled in her favor in March of 2021 after a long custody battle.
Rico Rodriquz’s Dad
Rico, who played Manny Delgado, was only a boy when he joined
the cast of Modern Family. That makes his loss while on the show even more tragic.
His father was his best friend and suddenly passed away at the age of 52. Rico was only
18 at the time and made an emotional and touching Instagram post. He called it the
toughest week of his life and waxed lyrical about all of his father’s wonderful qualities.
The Hiller Twins
Mitchell and Cam’s baby was originally played
by twins Ella and Jaden Hiller. They were in 36 episodes and got $200 each per day.
That was until they became tired of the long hours. Their mother Michelle was
also angry about how hard they had to work and how little pay they received
in comparison to the rest of the cast. The producers offered them a better deal,
including a $34,000 per episode raise. That wasn’t enough,
and Michelle pulled her twins from the show. That’s why Lily seems to have an unnatural
growth spurt after season three. She was played by the equally adorable Aubrey Anderson-Emmons.
Money Iaauwa
Cash can cause struggles in even the strongest families. It did create
issues in the cast of Modern Family, but they were able to overcome them.
Ed had the longest and most established career of any cast member, and that meant
the largest paycheck. He got $200,000 per episode and a large percentage of
back-end profits. The rest of the cast got $30,000-$90,000 per episode. It took
time in court for them to settle on a larger $150,000, even for the kids.
Kidney Transplants
Sarah was born with a life-threatening condition known as kidney dysplasia.
She had to continually battle it and was in pain despite her sunny disposition on
the show. She’d need several hours of sleep and had to sit down between takes. The entire time,
she kept up the attitude that “if you’re sick, you still go to work.”
Sarah needed a kidney transplant in 2012 due to complications from kidney dysplasia. It was the
only way to avoid being on dialysis for the rest of her life. Her father donated one of his. She
was so grateful and said, “you know that family is going to be there for you no matter what.”
The cast had to take precautions to make sure she recovered while they
were filming. These included wearing masks and keeping their distance.
She had to undergo another operation in 2017 for the same reason. It left her unable to
attend the Screen ActorsGuild Awards that year. She’s since recovered and became a
youth ambassador for the George Lopez Foundation to raise awareness for kidney donation. She also
speaks out against comments about how much weight the condition has caused her to lose.
Other Health Scares
Sarah wasn’t the only Modern Family cast member who struggled with their health.
Julie had to wear a pacemaker for years that was so well-hidden that almost no one knew about it.
She was diagnosed with hypervagotonia in her 20s. The condition causes her heart to beat too slowly.
She cried when she first had to have the pacemaker attached, believing it was “only for old people.”
She eventually came to terms with it and was grateful that the device existed. She has to get
it replaced every seven years, but it’s working as it should and she’s in excellent health.
Jesse had a skin cancer scare in 2015. It even required him to get facial surgery.
He had to have a piece of skin taken out of his cheek. It was thankfully nothing serious because
it was caught in time, but he was worried about what it could do for his career. In his own words,
“my face is my livelihood in this business.” He later posted a picture of himself after
surgery teasing the makeup team, a sign that his spirits had lifted. It also left him cancer-free.
Sophia also had a cancer scare in 2000. She was diagnosed with thyroid cancer and had to
have the organ removed. She controls the condition today with medication to prevent hypothyroidism.
Sarah Didn’t Like the Finale
Fans are almost always divided on a TV show’s finale, but what about the
cast? Sarah’s been brutally honest about the way Modern Family ended.
She doesn’t like the way they handled her character’s final moments. Having Haley
become a mother was great, but she doesn’t feel that it was fleshed out enough. She wishes the
showrunners would have used this change to give mothers credit for all they do.
Are you a Modern family superfan? Let us know in the comments.