Robert Caplin for The New York Times
Jesse Tyler Ferguson and Eric McCormack sit down for lunch.
Jesse Tyler Ferguson arrived 10 minutes early for the 1 p.m. reservation at Il Cantinori in Greenwich Village, wearing sunglasses and a porkpie hat, which he quickly removed as he expressed thanks for being invited to lunch. Then, Eric McCormack texted from his car to apologize for running late. Except that he wasn't: he arrived right on time.
Thus began a meal and conversation with two notable actors — one a straight man who came to fame playing the gay character Will on "Will & Grace," the other a gay man who has played straight in the past (most recently in Shakespeare's "Comedy of Errors") but who is best known as part of the gay couple on the hit series "Modern Family" — who seem to share, besides their TV fame, the virtue of being exceedingly polite.
PHILIP GALANES: Let's start with Joe Biden. Where else would I start with two gifted actors? Last summer, on "Meet the Press," the vice president came out in favor of gay marriage and said that "Will & Grace" had probably done more for the cause than anything else. Did that surprise you, Eric?
ERIC MCCORMACK: I was only surprised because things are moving so fast that "Will & Grace" seemed like an ancient reference. The obvious one, right now, is "Modern Family." We went off the air seven years ago. So for Biden to say that our show set the wheels in motion was great. No one else had given us credit for it.
PG: Did your phone start ringing?
EM: There was a lot, yes. But "Will & Grace" got to a point where you were watching it or you weren't. I mean, Will married Taye Diggs; I married a black guy in 2005 and Hall and Oates played at our wedding, and nobody talked about it. TV Guide barely mentioned. So maybe the story of the show is how normal it became to have that sort of thing in people's living rooms.
PG: Isn't that the idea that underpins Biden's statement? You really only need to meet the person you think is a freak before you realize: "Oh, he's just like me."
EM: I've always said: There's maybe a chunk of this country whose minds never change on the issue. But the ones whose minds do change won't change because of a rally in West Hollywood or the Village. They're going to change because of shows like ours that make it normal.
JESSE TYLER FERGUSON: That makes it safe. Ty Burrell [who plays Phil Dunphy on "Modern Family"] calls shows like ours "Trojan horses" because you sneak in there and make people feel comfortable. And then maybe you show a little bit of an agenda. But the audience is acclimated to it at a very comfortable rate.
EM: That's the real political time bomb. Neither of our shows made sexuality an issue. Will was gay on Day 1. And Jesse was part of a couple from Day 1.
PG: Do you ever think about the politics of a scene when you're reading a "Modern Family" script? Have you ever gone into the writers' room and said: "No, no, no. Or could we try it this way, instead?" Or is just being funny hard enough?
JTF: Obviously, our main objective is to be funny and make people laugh, and whatever comes out of it, comes out of it. But there were certain times, especially in our first season, when we didn't have any gay writers, when it was harder. Then in our second season, we acquired Abraham Higginbotham, who was also a writer on "Will & Grace" and a great — —
PG: I love that: "We acquired him." Like a yacht.
JTF: He and Jeff Richman are our two gay acquisitions. But in the first season, some of the writers would come to me and be like: "Is this offensive? Are we going too far with this?" And Eric Stonestreet [who plays Mr. Ferguson's partner on "Modern Family"] was always concerned about making sure everything was up to my standards. And I kept saying: Stop worrying about it! PG: Why's that?
JTF: Once you start worrying about being offensive, you're doing a disservice to yourself and the creative process. I also begged them to get some gay writers so I didn't have to be bothered with their questions.
EM: Well, that was the thing. We had our two creators. One was gay, and one was straight. So from the beginning, we had guys at the top who were going to take the heat.
PG: For all the progress, there was also a flip side to that "Meet the Press" piece. There were a lot of nasty, homophobic online comments about "Will & Grace" and gay people. And still, only 13 states allow gay marriage. Have you ever gotten blowback personally for playing gay on TV?
This interview has been condensed and edited.
This article has been revised to reflect the following correction:
Correction: July 26, 2013
Because of an editing error, an earlier version of this article contained a description by Jesse Tyler Ferguson of one of his early acting roles that was inaccurately recounted. The phrase should have read, "I played a suicidal kid who had this beautiful love story," not "I played a suicidal gay kid." An earlier version also misspelled the surname of Mr. Ferguson's husband. It is Mikita, not Mitka.
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