You may remember him as egotistical plastic surgeon Dr. Oliver Barnes in the 2005 Henry Winkler/Stockard Channing medical sitcom Out of Practice. Or as a smarmy weatherman with an unpronounceable last name in the 2007 Kelsey Grammer/Patricia Heaton sitcom Back to You. Or maybe even as doomed yacht captain Steve Marcus in the 2004 remake of the zombie horror classic Dawn of the Dead.
But odds are even if you’ve only seen one episode of (or arguably even one commercial for) ABC’s breakout comedy Modern Family, you aren’t likely to forget Ty Burrell as occasionally dimwitted, always kindhearted Dunphy dad Phil.
It’s a role that the new dad believes he may have born — or at the very least raised — to play, as he told me in an insightful and sometimes comical interview from the set of the upcoming feature film comedy Butter, not long before Family‘s season finale.
Channel Guide: You worked with two of the Modern Family writers — Chris Lloyd and Steve Levitan — before and they pretty much wrote the part of Phil for you. But they also said that they auditioned literally thousands of actors to come up with a believable family unit — were you part of all of those auditions?
Ty Burrell: I was. It was a very long process. Just having been on a couple of other shows, you really understand just what a business decision those things are. It’s not necessarily up to Chris and Steve who gets cast. And when I hear that something is maybe being written with me in mind, I don’t necessarily get my hopes up because there are just so many hoops that have to be jumped through — the network and the studio and things like that. They have a lot at stake and they have to make sure it’s right and they are extremely thorough about it. So I still went through three screen tests for the part and four auditions total. It was elaborate. But looking back on it — it was certainly worthwhile!
Modern Family seemed pretty brave on paper — and came replete with what, in lesser hands, could have been a host of touchy stereotypes and TV clichés — trophy wife, bumbling dad, gay couple. But it’s all so organic and there’s never been anything quite like it on TV. What did you think when you first got the script?
I am firmly in the camp of believing that there really is no “new” story, you know? And I totally, completely agree with you that when I first heard the idea, I thought in my silly little mind this is either a formula for something genius — or something really generic.
Obviously being written by Chris Lloyd and Steve Levitan is a huge advantage to any show, because in my opinion they are masters of what they do. And I think you’re right — in lesser hands, it would be nothing but stereotypes. But the openness of the setup in their hands, because they ARE so good, has become its strength. There are so many combinations and so many storylines that can be told in the family because they’ve left it so wide open, and while that would be such a challenge to a young writer or to a writer who wasn’t as skilled as they are — for them, it’s just a huge open playing field. I think it’s just a real tribute to their mastery.
We got really, really lucky because there was a comedy drought on television and some of the best writers in Hollywood were between projects or doing something on their own and we ended up with a writing staff where, if you go down through all of their resumes, they’ve all had their own shows and could have their own shows right now.
Keeping that quality up week-to-week means that you have to have an incredible staff, too. One week to the next, we have that writer on set for the episode. And each week, whoever is in the chair is somebody who is really, really experienced at what they do.
What’s it like to work with such an incredible mix of comic talent, right on down to all of the kids? There’s no weak link in the bunch …
Because we often film most of the episodes separately — it’s kind of compartmentalized in that way — I have the benefit of watching a good portion of every show just like every other fan. And my love for those two other families is so deep. I love watching them and when we’re lucky enough to all work together, we’re just having so much fun with each other. I think it’s one of the intangibles that really defy analysis — I certainly couldn’t explain it — but the chemistry in our cast is real. We really do feel like we’re a family of sorts and we really do enjoy each other’s company.
And just speaking from my perspective, I just love watching them work and getting the chance to work with them. Every one of them. I get so excited reading the call sheet and going, “Oh I get to work with Jesse today! I get to work with Eric today! I get to work with Sophia today!” It’s just been a dream.
I think there’s also something really genius in the way that the writers don’t give us too much of anything — in a good way. I feel like, just as a viewer myself, when I watch the show, I do want more. And I feel like they know we want more. I feel like the writers know that the audience would like to see the family together all the time, but I think there’s more power in keeping it for certain moments of episodes.
And there’s a really incredible thing about keeping those three storylines weaving through the episodes and the genius of not allowing you to sit on one storyline too long. There’s a lot of restraint.
You’ve said that there is improv on the show — to what degree? It all seems so genuine and effortless that I can’t tell what’s improv and what’s scripted, and it drives me a little nuts.
Well, I don’t know if I want you to know! [laughs]
It’s less than you would think, I’m guessing. I don’t know what people actually imagine. But what really happens is, we usually get a few passes. We shoot the show in a really wonderful style with two cameras at once, so that we can improvise — meaning so you don’t have to replicate a performance, because you have it from both sides. You don’t have to redo a performance when you turn the camera around.
So we usually do a few takes of something scripted and maybe a few different tweaks and then we kind of start to play around with it. It’s a collaborative thing where we’ll throw out ideas and we’ll get an extra take if we as actors have an idea or two. And I would say that in the final cut, a very small percentage of what is improvised ends up in the show. It’s maybe, you know, 1 or 2 jokes per scene is actually improvised.
The interviews can be a little bit different. The interviews can involve a little bit more improv, and that’s including from the writing staff. We’ll kind of get into the interviews and after a take or two, there’ll be sort of a huddle — including Jason Winer, by the way, who is our primary director and a really, truly funny guy — so the interviews have a lot more … possibility I guess is the best word for it … in terms of improv. Often the interviews are totally different than when we went in.
And because we all get along so well, we spend a lot of time with the writing staff, which is not entirely common. And all the writers are coming back. We are very, very lucky in that we’re not losing writers. People are so really wanting to be writing for the show — and they’re all people who really could be running their own shows — so I’m really confident in the quality of the show for our next season due to the fact that our writers will be back.
And it’s a very civil place to work. There are a lot of elements to the job, including something as basic as hours. Because we’re shooting with two cameras at once, we’re finished at a reasonable hour. And people love to be able to get home to their kids!
Including you [Burrell and his wife recently adopted baby daughter Frances]. Have you acquired a wealth of parenting knowledge from the show?
[Laughs] I am so knowledge free! It’s a steep learning curve, I will say that, but it’s been an incredible few weeks with the baby! And it’s very difficult to be away. Thank goodness for iChat.
The most amazing thing is that it has none of the mundane qualities that I thought bringing up a child would. At least at this age, it seems like every hour she’s changed. Like every time I turn around she’s grown and she sees a little further and she’s interested in more things.
I definitely am going to have stories for the Mitch and Cam story line! I’m going to bring in a lot!
Do the writers try to incorporate the actors’ personal quirks and tics and habits and stories into the scripts?
Obviously everybody shares some traits with their characters, but a lot of the folks on the show are more different from our characters than I think we initially thought. One of the things I really love about playing Phil, and one of the ways in which Phil and I are different that’s significant, is that I am an incredibly neurotic person and Phil is basically the sound of the waves crashing on the beach.
But storylines, absolutely! According to the writers, their hardest job is breaking a story. As a writer, you really have to break a story that can hold up so it’s not just a joke. You really can’t have just some funny incident that happened. So they’re actually hungry for us to come in and tell us what’s been happening in their lives, because they’re looking for stories all the time. And I’ve been definitely taking notes about having a little girl, so hopefully I can help.
We’ve gotten to see some of the cast member’s hidden talents — a la Eric’s clowning and drumming skills. Do you have any hidden talents, and if, so, might we see them via Phil?
I don’t know if I have any talents, period! Uhhhh. I delusionally thought I was going to be a professional athlete when I was kid. So I do a lot of, like, injuring myself playing sports. The batting cage stuff was as close as I’ve gotten to feeling like my youth, because my youth was all spent on a field or on a court or something.
Otherwise, my talents are stuff like eating spicy food for breakfast. Really not a lot going on there.
Phil is most often described as a dad who desperately wants to be friends with his kids — but I don’t really see it that way. I see Phil as someone who just wildly enjoys his life and everything he does and completely believes he is cool, so why wouldn’t his children like him? Is that in the ballpark of how you see him, too?
Yes! That’s a really interesting question, because one of the interesting things about doing a show like this is that, if it runs, these characters become more and more complicated with every episode. And I love that. I love that Phil isn’t just the cool dad — which was the thing from the pilot really that was driving the character descriptions. Because the pilot was based on him thinking he’s cool. Which he does. At many, many junctures.
But the more we do the show, the more you realize that there are so many different elements to that, one of which is what you just said: He is a big kid and he’s just totally enjoying his life and sharing these things that he thinks are cool with his kids.
You’ve also said you feel a little bad for women who tell you their husbands are just like Phil or men who say they themselves are just like him. But my own husband does have a little Phil in him in that I just don’t think either guy is all that terribly interested in the expectations that go their chronological age. Again, am I close?
I think the predominant thing about Phil that I don’t feel bad about anybody saying their husband is like Phil — other than I hope they’re not as oblivious as Phil — and the thing that I really love about Phil is that he has such an incredible heart. He means so well; he is such a well-intended, militantly positive guy. And that to me is the thing that is really coming the fore over 24 episodes of writing. There is a real sense that Phil just really cares. He often has no idea what he’s doing, but he really wants to be a great dad. And he really wants to be a great husband. The obliviousness falls into the category of him thinking he’s a better father and a better husband and a better brother-in-law and a better son-in-law than he might actually be, but the care and earnestness is one of the things — maybe THE thing that I like most about him.
Phil is really enjoying his days. I think he really knows how good he’s got it. He is so grateful for Clare and for his kids. Phil is not particularly self aware — I mean, Phil is very un-self-aware — but the elements of Phil that we get to see glimpses of, those are just tiny epiphanies when Phil’s consciousness kind of lands sometimes — gratitude for his kids and for his life and for his wife.
That is truly the greatest pleasure to be able to perform. It’s invigorating. It really is. It’s an energizing thing, and a really great to way roll out of bed and get ready for my day. And that aspect of it really bleeds into my life. There’s no way it can’t have an effect on you, the same way playing villains and jerks and cynics — which I’ve certainly played my fair share of — how that can bleed into your life as well. I’m extremely lucky to play Phil Dunphy.
I read somewhere that you think your face is more suited to playing evil guys, but I think there’s just something about your face when you play Phil — and you definitely have a “Phil face” — that is so open and exuberant. Like a Labrador who wants you to throw the ball. Is that a conscious thing or something that just happens when you play the character?
My Phil face. I love it! But, God, if I were more conscious, I would try to make myself much more dignified!
For whatever reason, in my initial casting as an actor — and I always attribute it to my raccoon eyes and Frankenbrow — somehow there was a natural tendency to cast me as the bad guy. I think maybe because I have the good fortune to know Chris and Steve as people, that it goes a long way in any situation as far as casting goes. When you’re going into audition, it’s shockingly short. You would be so surprised at how fast these auditions are. And I think for whatever reason, the brief experience of my face on the casting folks early on was I would come in and read a villain part and on first glance I looked that part. And that’s how I made my living. And by the way, I am extremely grateful for those parts — they paid the bills for a long time and many of them were really fun, great jobs. But I’m really, really grateful to play somebody well intended.
You’ve said that you come from a family of gifted storytellers and naturally funny people, and that you and your brother did a lot of improv in which you preferred to play the guy who just didn’t get it. Do you feel now like Phil was just out there somewhere waiting for you?
I grew up in a family that really spent a great deal of energy trying to make each other laugh and telling stories and playing characters and improvising. So it was the most natural thing in the world to me, right from the beginning. I got sidetracked with dramatic stuff and Shakespeare — and it was really good for me in so many ways — but I’ve always felt most comfortable doing comedy.
My dad and his brother would improvise at dinner and it just would make us giddy. And so my brother and I started improvising when we were really young. And one of the primary things you figure out when you’re improvising is this kind of power play and who’s in control and who’s running the scene. This particular relationship, which I would say is kind of at the essence of the Phil and Clare relationship, definitely was one that we went to many, many times in front of the family to try and get a laugh. He being more of the taskmaster. Which, of course, he was younger than me and at the time he was much smaller than me — nothin’ wrong with a visual joke either! I got tons and tons of practice doing that.
So as I’ve started to do more comedy — and I’ve told my brother this many times — I felt like I’ve been practicing for this since I was 8 or 9 years old.
Phil seems to have the most natural and happy relationship with the unseen documentary filmmakers. Is that cool for you as an actor — especially one playing an extreme extrovert — to have a sort of pair of audiences to play to?
I love it. I think that Phil is a ham. It’s part of his joy — he loves to share everything with his kids, he loves to share it with Clare, he loves to share it with the camera and it’s so much fun for me as an actor to play somebody like that. Phil is just self aware enough — well, not self aware enough to avoid the trouble that he gets into — but he’s just self aware enough to try to cover up his mistakes. And then the camera becomes a part of that as well — which I love. I love that Phil basically considers the camera as another member of the family.
The thing that surprised me most about the show is that there is always a feel-good takeaway that somehow doesn’t seemed forced or detract from the comedic impact …
Nobody watches our show for the same reason that they watch Lost or Grey’s Anatomy or any of that stuff.
Chris Lloyd, one of our fearless leaders, describes it as nourishment. People have been confused by certain shows not getting an audience and I think his point is that people do want to laugh — but there is something in storytelling that you want to be nourished by it, too. And I really do think that the writing for Modern Family is nourishing. And that’s not going to change. Even if for some reason, there was another trend, say, and comedy went back to snarky shows, I know for a fact that this show is not going to change. They’re not going to back off of it.
Anything else you can share about Season 2?
I don’t really know anything yet! They’ve already gotten together and they are breaking some stories now, but I don’t know anything. I’m very excited to see what’s going to happen, too!
The cast recently made news for submitting yourselves in supporting categories for the Emmys. I thought it made perfect sense. What were the discussions like among the cast?
We all were feeling that this is a true ensemble — maybe more than any show that I know of. It’s really just an evenly divided show, so it made sense to us. I think for us it made sense in a lot of ways, because if one person or four people or six people get nominated, we are all going to be extremely excited. The fact that we all submitted ourselves as supporting is symbolic if nothing else: We love this show and a rising tide lifts all boats.
While we wait to see back on the small screen in the second season of Modern Family, you’ve also been busy with a number of big screen projects as well, including Fair Game based on the Valerie Plame scandal, Morning Glory with Rachel McAdams, Harrison Ford and Diane Keaton; and Butter, which you’re filming now with Jennifer Garner and Hugh Jackman. Tell me a little bit about each …
Well, Fair Game is really just a cameo. I did it because I was just so excited to do some scenes with a couple New York actors that I knew and really admired — Sean Penn and Naomi Watts, obviously. But I’m in that for only a couple small scenes.
Morning Glory I really, truly enjoyed. It’s similar to other parts that I’ve played, which is kind of a smarmy boss, but it’s such a charming film and such a wonderful group of people. I really liked that whole experience.
And Butter has been an incredible experience so far, too. We’re just at the beginning of it.
It’s funny, because film now seems so much more — in a way — like theater used to. It’s almost like a summer camp quality, where it’s very intense and requires a tremendous amount of focus. And it’s very transient, as well. You’re in kind of a time crunch, so you’re basically trying to get to know people well in a short period of time, which has been the case on this film. We’re all tremendously enjoying each other’s company — but you don’t have the luxury of 24 weeks to get to know people. It’s also based really on crafting the minutiae of every scene. Every scene is one script, obviously. So there is a tremendous amount of detail and care. It’s really fun and a change of pace.
You play a championship butter carver in flux … so did you actually learn to make art from dairy?
I’m not actually filmed carving. I’m filmed finishing up a couple of carvings. So we actually had a seminar with the foremost food carver in America and he was really helpful in showing us techniques and giving us kind of a one-day course. I feel very comfortable with what I am actually doing in the film.
Catch the season finale of Modern Family Wednesday, May 19, on ABC.
