‘Modern Family’ star Eric Stonestreet talks comedy, cooking and Cameron’s cuffs

What led to Eric Stonestreet’s Emmy win in August, according to the burly Modern Family star, began in part by his parents’ constant support back home in Kansas City. “It all starts with them being supportive of me from very early on and laughing at my jokes and thinking I was a character, rather than thinking I was some strange, weird kid,” says Stonestreet, who applied to clown college twice, with his mom making the journey to Chicago when he auditioned once while at Kansas State University. “Rather than squelching those creative ideas, they nurtured them and allowed me to express myself however I wanted to.” These days, Stonestreet expresses himself in many ways — with a colorful fashion sense, cheery outlook and over-the-top kindness — as Cameron, the stay-at-home half of a same-sex couple (alongside Jesse Tyler Ferguson‘s equally entertaining Mitchell) with an adopted little girl on the hit ABC sitcom. Next up for him (in addition to new episodes of Modern Family starting in January): Bad Teacher, a big-screen summer comedy opposite Justin Timberlake and Cameron Diaz in which he stars as Kirk, “a mixed martial artist/wannabe weightlifter-type guy who thinks he’s sort of tough but is pretty pathetic,” Stonestreet says. I interviewed the actor recently for a feature in this weekend’s magazine, but read below for more from the interview, where he talks about what led to his most famous character yet and what he likes best about the Midwest.

Photos courtesy of ABC

How much has the success of Modern Family and your Emmy win changed your life?
I don’t have the time to do things that I used to be able to do. I know what I’m doing for the most part every day. I don’t have the free time, which is very welcome. I love having a job obviously. But other than that, my life’s pretty much the same. After the Emmy, people asked me if I felt any different, and I said, “You know, I was still gassy the next day.” Nothing really physically changed for me. [Laughs]

Your character’s so well loved. Do you like the recognition?
People are really great and nice. There’s a familiarity people have with all the characters on the show. We all get the same sort of compliments: “You bring our family together”; “I watch TV with my mom. I’ve never done that before”; “I watch TV with my husband. I’ve never done that before.” We all get those meaningful compliments, in addition to “Hey, let me get a picture with you” or “Would you sign my napkin?” or whatever. Listen, when people thank you for doing your job, you know you’ve got a good job. It’s hard as an actor to feel when you’re auditioning and doing the daily grind that what you do is important, and how are you going to leave an impression on someone or a legacy someday. When you’re a fireman you’re gonna pull people out of burning buildings. When you’re a doctor, you’re gonna save people. When you’re an actor, well, what am I doing for the world? How am I helping people? This job has given us all the opportunity to see that we provide laughs for people, and that matters. That means something.

What has been your key to playing Cameron so well?
For me in the beginning, it was just looking at how my mom acts, mimicking and invoking her mannerisms and gestures and her desire to make everyone happy and be happy. Life is complicated, but Cameron is one of those guys who’s like, “No no no, let’s not do this now.” Or, “Let’s do this now, let’s have the moment right now.” I always think of Cameron as someone who doesn’t want to let a moment pass. Moments are what define life, and I think Cameron lives in the moment and wants to express the moment and expand the moment and expound on the moment. And as the character grows and is more written and more informed and the writers come up with backstory, then I try to take all of that into consideration. But the easiest and simplest answer is I really try not to think about it.

Are you a living-in-the-moment kind of guy?
No, which is why it’s really nice to go and get to play Cameron. I don’t mean to sound pretentious and “play this character,” but it is that. I get to go to work every day and get to don a pair of loafers and an awesome shirt and get my hair done and really do become another person, with aspects of who I am that I wish I could be more every day. I don’t feel like I’m playing someone completely different – I just feel like I’m bringing out personality traits that 39 years have gotten in the way of me expressing on a regular basis. I always think we want to be the best person we can be in a situation, and sometimes we succeed but a lot of times we fail, whether it be in relationships or with the cash register clerk or with losing your patience in traffic. Cameron is that opportunity for me to learn how to do the most spirited and usually the best thing in a moment. It’s a good opportunity for me.

You were a killer on NCIS, a criminal on Nip/Tuck, and had a recurring role on CSI for a few seasons. Did it take finding a character like Cameron to put you in a groove?
I’d never really gotten the opportunity to create an arc of a character. All of my character work for 12-13 years was done in my car, alone, with friends, at barbecues sitting around my fire pit at the house — that was always my preparation for things, knowing that I could do characters and do different people but never really getting those opportunities. The year leading up to Modern Family, I got four really nice parts on shows that people were watching or were critically acclaimed, so I felt like coming into it I was in a little bit of a groove. It takes time and it takes a lot of persistence. I really feel like all the years leading up to the moment I went in for an audition for Modern Family, but for any part, was all preparation leading up to that moment. The door opened a little bit with Modern Family, and I had taken my career serious enough and prepared enough and had enough experience to take advantage of that crack in that door and made my way in and hopefully can stay for a while. [Laughs]

What’s your favorite part about your hometown?
What I love about Kansas City and the Midwest in general — Chicago and Kansas and Manhattan, Kan., where I went to college at Kansas State — is the earnestness of people. “How you doing?” in Manhattan, Kan., literally means “How you doing?” Here in L.A., it might mean, “How you doing, and oh by the way, how did you get your first agent?” Or “How you doing and hey, if I wanted to get a script to Modern Family writers, how would I do that?” At home, a moment’s a moment, a question’s a question, and people are genuinely excited for my career and what’s happened with me.

Do you have any favorite comedians?
Not growing up ever wanting to be an actor, I never really thought of it. In retrospect, I’ve had to go back and think about, well, obviously those parents were influencing me. I loved Benny Hill. I remember watching The Carol Burnett Show and just dying laughing watching Harvey Korman and Tim Conway. I loved John Candy later on when I saw him in Stripes and in Vacation. Obviously being a big kid, I identified with a big guy and he was definitely one of them.

Being a fan of the grill, what is your perfect meal?
I’ll tell you what I don’t want in my meal. I don’t want goat cheese anywhere near my meal. [Laughs] I love to cook for people. I love to have people over and I love to throw things on the grill. I love to make people happy with food. It’s a passion. I love watching the Food Network and being inspired and then not copying it, but using it as inspiration and figuring out my twist on it. When I’m eating things, I’m always thinking about “Oooh, this would also be good with…” I pride myself on throwing a good steak on the grill and knowing what to do and what not to do and not to overseason it, not to overcook it. The simpler the better with those things. With burgers, it’s all about meat patty size and bun. That’s where people make their mistake: They don’t get the right bun for the right size burger or they put too many things on top of it. You’ve got to really think about burgers.

It’s always fun to see what Cameron’s wearing from week to week. What is the best thing you’ve worn on the show?
I saw Cameron as the stay-at-home mom or dad, however you want to look at that. And from that I extrapolated that there are moms out there who wake up every morning and stay in their sweatpants and know they’re not going anywhere and they don’t put their makeup and they’re just going to be home with the kids and SpaghettiOs. That’s their life, what they’re doing. And there are the moms who wake up and while the husband or older child is still home, they use that opportunity to shower, curl their hair, put their makeup on and get ready for the day. That’s what Cameron is. Cameron’s the guy who wakes up in the morning, gets himself ready while Mitchell’s still there, he puts on a pressed, nice shirt, he puts on his jeans, he puts on his shoes, he does his hair, and he gets ready. It was important for me that Cameron have a style unto himself, and I really like the idea of the shirts that we wear that have contrasting cuffs with the colors. That’s sort of the Cameron outfit. The wardrobe helps me so much because the shoes I wear are not shoes I would wear, the shirts I wear are not shirts I would wear, and the cuff, if you watch me, the cuffs influence me and affect me. I’m always moving my hand around the cuff. It’s an important part of my character. There’s a custom shirt maker in L.A. that makes my shirts, Anto of Beverly Hills, and they have made shirts for every famous person you can think of. They made shirts for Frank Sinatra, Ronald Reagan, Dean Martin – you name them, they’ve made their shirts since the ’30s and ’40s. It is such a treat every day to come into my trailer and see what the shirt looks like. I don’t get to pick the fabrics or anything like that. I just help pick the style and then they just go crazy with what I wear. I love them all. The hair people are the same way. You have the really awesome opportunity and piece of this puzzle, the character. The writers write my words I get to say, I get to say them, you get to dress the character. I just look at it as an all-hands-on-deck approach to Cameron.

Would you ever do UFC or mixed martial arts?
No, I wouldn’t. [Laughs[ Those are trained skilled professionals, and I think I would be knocked out within about four seconds. [Modern Family co-star] Ed O’Neill is a black belt in Brazilian jujitsu and we talk about MMA a lot, and he’s explained a lot of things to me and why this works and why this doesn’t work. I asked him one day, “Now Ed, if you and I really did have an issue, and you needed to…,” and before I could finish, he goes, “Four seconds.”