Yahoo Lifestyle Eric Stonestreet Says He and Jesse Tyler Ferguson Were 'Hurt' by Pass on “Modern Family ”Spinoff: Would've 'Been a Slam Dunk'
Stonestreet said there was a "really great script" for a Cam and Mitchell spinoff but the network said no
Eric Stonestreet and Jesse Tyler Ferguson would've loved nothing more than to continue Cam and Mitchell's story.
Stonestreet, who played Ferguson's TV husband for 11 years on Modern Family, reflected on what could have been in the spinoff series that was very seriously considered following the sitcom's conclusion in 2020.
In particular, Stonestreet said the spinoff would've picked up following the finale reveal that Cam (Stonestreet) and Mitchell (Ferguson) were moving to Missouri with their daughter Lily (Aubrey Anderson-Emmons) and baby son Rexford.
"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,” Stonestreet, 53, recalled during a Sept. 18 interview with Graham Bensinger.
He admitted that the network passing on the spinoff "hurt Jesse and I’s feelings," as well as Modern Family co-creater Lloyd's.
"I think Jesse and I 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 just felt a little hurtful," he continued, adding, "I love my character. I love the show. I love Jesse. We had a great working relationship, we had amazing chemistry."
Not only was ABC passing on the spinoff script hurtful, but Stonestreet also thinks they missed out on a hit.
"I think it would have been a slam dunk," he told Bensinger. "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. It wasn’t like two ancillary writers that were just being like, 'Hey, we’re looking for a money grab here, and want to do a spinoff, and if it lasts a year, whatever, we made a couple of hundred thousand dollars.'"
Ferguson, 48, has also spoken previously about the potential Cam and Mitchell spinoff, as he told Andy Cohen on Watch What Happens Live in 2022 that there were "discussions" but "the network decided against it."
"I think they were just wondering if this was the right family to still tell that story," Ferguson explained. "We'd been on for 11 years, I think they were ready to move in a different direction."
Robert Ashcroft/Getty
Aubrey Anderson-Emmons as Lily Tucker-Pritchett, Jesse Tyler Ferguson as Mitchell Pritchett, and Eric Stonestreet as Cameron Tucker in 'Modern Family'Though a spinoff seemingly wasn't in the cards for Cam and Mitchell, Ferguson and Stonestreet got to return to the Modern Family set in May — along with Julie Bowen and Ty Burrell — to film a WhatsApp commercial as their beloved characters.
The commercial began with Phil (Burrell), Claire (Bowen) and Cam reacting to a photo that Haley (Sarah Hyland) sent to the family group chat, only to accidentally upset Mitchell who walks in to find out that he's not in said group chat.
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All nine seasons of Modern Family can be streamed on Hulu.
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