Jesse Tyler Ferguson has defended the
gay characters on Modern Family by declaring himself a gay
cliché.
The 37-year-old Ferguson, who is
engaged to lawyer Justin Mikita, plays Mitchell Pritchett, the
partner of Cameron Tucker (played by Eric Stonestreet), on the ABC
Wednesday night sitcom.
In an interview with gay glossy The
Advocate, Ferguson said a frequent complaint is that the
show's gay couple isn't a positive representation of the gay
community.
“We're always coming up against the
criticism that our characters are stereotypical and don't represent
what it is to be gay,” Ferguson said. “But my argument has
always been, I know so many people who are just like Mitchell and
Cam, and so many people who are nothing like them. We're
representing a very specific couple in gay America and do not
represent the entire gay community with those characters.”
He continued, “Mitchell is basically
me, so when people tell me I'm stereotypical and cliché in that
role, then Jesse Tyler Ferguson is stereotypical and cliché, because
I'm basically doing no acting at all. We're all clichés of
ourselves.”