Ariel Winter is down for a Dunphy-Pritchett family reunion.
Five years after the Modern Family cast bid farewell to their beloved characters, the actress—who starred in the 11-season series from 2009 to 2020—revealed whether she’d revisit her role as the super-intelligent middle Dunphy daughter, Alex.
“I’d definitely be open to it,” Ariel told E! News in an exclusive interview. “But that’s not up to me. That’s up to the powers that be. If they want to hit me up, they can hit me up.”
As for what she’d like to see for Alex—who accepts a research position in Switzerland during the series finale—if she were to return for a revival?
“Alex had so many different interests,” the Sofia the First star reflected. “They were all extremely educational, smart and amazing interests. But I would hope that she has expanded her life in so many ways that I know she could have.”
“I hope now that she’s found herself totally in the way that she would want to,” Ariel explained, “and put some effort into finding her heart and what she loves personally, because she’s already achieved so much professionally.”
Although the 27-year-old admired Alex’s growth in the series, she believed that her character could’ve afforded “a more flourishing life.”
She added, “She definitely could have branched out in so many more areas and still have the career and stuff that she had.”
For Ariel, the growth she wants to see in Alex mirrors her own life. Indeed, her new role as Delaney in POOLS—which follows Kennedy (Odessa A’zion) as her life falls apart following the unexpected death of her dad—was different than any role she had done before.
“I was just looking to do something new and different and play a completely different character from what I had been doing,” she said. “This was really that. It got sent to me and I was like, ‘Alright, I think if this is done right, this could be really, really fun.'”
Portraying Kennedy’s ex-best friend, who just finished her sophomore year of college, meant that the Kiss Kiss Bang Bang actress had to find ways to connect with her character.
“What I really relate to most is that everybody is growing and changing at that age,” she shared.
“I feel like I’m still growing and changing. I don’t really think that you really ever stop.”
Although she relates to Delaney’s “hard exterior,” it took time to discover the deeper aspects of her character.
“I really had to open myself up to and learn about and figure out how to relate to,” she explained. “You take experiences you’ve had with other people in your life that you feel like they relate to that character. Then you’re like, ‘Alright, I can pull from this person, I can pull from this experience,’ and then you build that person, and you become them for a little bit.”
POOLS is now in select theaters and will be released nationwide on Sept. 5.
To see where Ariel and her Modern Familycrew are now, keep reading.
Sarah Hyland as Haley Dunphy
As eldest Dunphy daughter Haley, Sarah Hyland rode off into sunset (or at least a new apartment) with longtime love Dylan (Reid Ewing) and their twins. IRL, the New York City native saw forever in Bachelor in Paradise bartender Wells Adams‘ eyes (costar Jesse Tyler Ferguson officiated their 2022 vows) and soaked up the Fiji sun as host of Love Island USA for two seasons.
Other gigs included six episodes of Pitch Perfect: Bumper in Berlin and Broadway gigs in Little Shop of Horrors and The Great Gatsby. As for what she’d tell younger Sarah, “Don’t be too hard on yourself,” she detailed to E! News in 2023. “Love the people around you, but love you more.”
Ariel Winter as Alex Dunphy
While Ariel Winter‘s Alex jetted off to a new gig in Switzerland, the child actress stayed a bit closer to home when she decamped from her native California with longtime boyfriend Luke Benward.
In addition to giving life to the titular Disney princess on Sofia the First, she’s done voice work for American Dad!, Firebuds and Star Trek: Lower Decks and worked on the docuseries SOSA Undercover. “I only felt recently like I found my purpose,” the actress and activist told E! News in October 2024. “As a kid, I wanted to be a doctor, then a lawyer—and now here I am an entertainer. So I can use that platform to help people, but that’s just kind of always been my vibe.”
Nolan Gould as Luke Dunphy
When Luke Dunphy enrolled at the University of Oregon, Nolan Gould signed up for his own adventure. “Fell off the Earth again here’s some proof of life,” he joked in a December 2024 Instagram featuring a series of solo shots in various locales.
He also filled Ferguson in on his travels, detailing on a September 2024 episode of his Dinner’s On Me podcast how he sold off his belongings after Modern Family to travel the country in a van—in between filming 2023’s Camp, the 2024 short JOE and an episode of Grey’s Anatomy.
Aubrey Anderson-Emmons (a.k.a. Frances Anderson) as Lily Tucker-Pritchett
Following her nine seasons as daughter to Eric Stonestreet‘s Cameron Tucker and Ferguson’s Mitchell Pritchett, Aubrey Anderson-Emmons “thought that I would never act again in my life,” the L.A. native shared in a 2024 TikTok. But after getting bit by the bug again through high school theater productions, she got back on the audition circuit.
And while the actress still has plans to pursue her craft, she’s also focusing on another passion: music. In fact, she’s got a new name to go with her new career path, changing her moniker to Frances Anderson.
“Frances is actually part of my legal name,” she explained to E! News in August 2025. “It’s my middle name, and it’s after my mom’s old family friend.”
While Anderson said she changed her name to make it a bit shorter, she also noted she wanted “people to see a new side of me,” and “create a space specifically just for music.”
Rico Rodriguez as Manny Delgado
Since his stint as wise beyond his years Manny—the son of Sofía Vergara‘s Gloria Delgado—Rico Rodriguez has appeared in an episode of Disney’s Bunk’d and voiced a part in the upcoming 2025 flick Sneaks. As for his onscreen fam, “TV show reunions are all the rage these days,” he captioned a look at their 2023 get-together. “When we hanging next guys?!”
Jeremy Maguire as Joe Pritchett
“I’ve been told I’m a 30-year-old in a kid’s body,” Jeremy Maguire told E! News in an exclusive 2024 interview. “I’ve been told I’m an old soul. Which, I do think that of myself, too.”
Born in 2011—two years before the series made its debut on ABC—he joined the fam in 2015 as Joe Pritchett, Gloria and husband Jay Pritchett’s son. “When you’re growing up and there’s a camera in front of your face, sometimes you don’t wrap your head around the fact that these aren’t your actual family,” he explained to E!. “And that’s just really hard, especially for me because, you know, I love everybody. After Modern ended, I was so sad ’cause only life I’ve ever known.”
He rebounded quickly, however, appearing in all 12 episodes of Disney’s Turner & Hooch reboot in 2021. And should the right part not come his way, he’s ready to write it himself. “It’s very therapeutic,” he said. “I’ve done poems or stories, or little treatments for scripts I thought would be fun to maybe work on in the future.”
Ty Burrell as Phil Dunphy
Experiencing a bit of a drought before being cast as the loveable Dunphy patriarch, “My wife and I actually sat down at one point to kind of like come up with a list of other things that I could do because I was thinking about getting out of acting,” Ty Burrell revealed on Good Morning America ahead of the series’ 2020 finale. The list was admittedly brief, however. “I had nothing,” he joked. “I have no other skillset.”
Though a plan B proved unnecessary, with the Oregon native—who shares daughters Frances and Greta with wife Holly Burrell—lending his voice to Fox’s Duncanville after Modern Family, he’s opened a series of restaurants in Utah anyway.
Living in the Beehive State means he doesn’t get a lot of face time with his former costars (and memorably missed out on their 2023 gathering at Vergara’s place, leading some fans to think he’d died), but their text chain is still alive and well. “That group was obviously just very tight,” he noted to People in 2025. “We went through a lot together, and everybody stays in touch.”
Julie Bowen as Claire Dunphy
Five years after she bid farewell to straightlaced Claire, Julie Bowen still very much considers her TV crew as family. Whether it was helping Hyland escape from what Hyland called an abusive relationship or turning up to Anderson-Emmons’ high school play, “I look at them all like my kids,” Bowen explained on a June 2024 episode of The Skinny Confidential Him & Her Podcast. “I love them.” And as for her onscreen stepmom Vergara, Bowen told E! News in 2024, “We get along like a house on fire.”
The actress’ career remains hot thanks to Peacock thriller Hysteria! and the Happy Gilmore sequel, however, “I’m pretty frugal,” she shared on the All Good Things with Jason Nash podcast in 2022. “I’m so afraid that I’m never going to work again and, I’m not kidding, I have such fear.”
And while she joked she’s been in “retirement” from dating following her 2018 split from husband Scott Phillips (they share sons Oliver, John and Gustav), she wouldn’t mind doing some late night talking with Harry Styles. “Oh, hell yeah,” she quipped on The Ellen DeGeneres Show. “Him? Look at him!”
Sofia Vergara as Gloria Pritchett
Stepping into Gloria’s stilettos turned Colombia-bred Vergara into a household name. But her post-Modern Family career has been no laughing matter. Along with shooting films like This Is Me… Now and Despicable Me 4—plus her six-seasons-and-counting stint on the America’s Got Talent judges panel—the mom to adult son Manolo, booked her first dramatic gig.
Portraying the titular drug lord Griselda Blanco in Netflix’s 2024 miniseries Griselda, she amassed another Golden Globe and Emmy nod. “It was a surprise for me to be nominated,” Vergara exclusively told Laverne Cox on Live From E!: Emmys. “It was my first time acting in a drama, acting in Spanish believe it or not. It was like a surprise—and a good surprise.”
So now she’s manifesting a bit more good fortune. Two years after announcing her split from husband Joe Manganiello, Vergara told Access Hollywood in January 2025, she’s hoping for, “Health, money, a boyfriend. Or a lover, maybe.”
Jesse Tyler Ferguson as Mitchell Pritchett
Producers may have thrown a wet blanket on our dreams when they squashed plans to follow Ferguson’s Mitchell Pritchett and his husband Cam Tucker (Eric Stonestreet) as they decamped to Missouri. “I think they were just wondering if this was the right family to still tell that story,” the actor explained on Watch What Happens Live. “We had been on for 11 years, I think they were ready to move in a different direction.”
But fans hoping to take a trip down memory lane need only listen in to his Dinner’s On Me podcast, where he hosts both his former costars and other celebrities like Gavin Rossdale and Chelsea Handler. Otherwise, Ferguson has stayed quite busy with movies like Cocaine Bear and theater productions such as Here We Are.
As for his own modern family, the TV star is married to actor-producer Justin Mikita and they share sons Beckett and Sullivan.
Eric Stonestreet as Cam Tucker
Since his time as football coach Cam, Kansas native Stonestreet has been tackling new roles on American Auto and The Santa Clauses and he’s set to kill in the upcoming Dexter: Resurrection revival. “I too have some free agency news,” the Kansas City Chiefs fan joked in a March 2025 Instagram post. “Very excited to work with this outstanding group of people.”
IRL, he’s teamed up with nurse Lindsay Schweitzer, Stonestreet announcing their marriage on the same day he turned 54.
“It’s my birthday and guess what I got,” he wrote on Instagram in September 2025. “I got married!”
Ed O’Neill as Jay Pritchett
Already a famous TV dad thanks to his 11-season gig on the Married…with Children couch, Ed O’Neill easily slipped into his role as Pritchett family patriarch Jay. Initially reluctant to sign on for another sitcom, “They sent me the script,” he shared on The Jenny McCarthy Show in 2016, “and I thought, ‘Damn. I gotta do this.'”
He’s since suited up as Los Angeles Clippers owner Donald Sterling in 2024’s Clipped and will appear in Ryan Murphy‘s legal drama series All’s Fair.
In his personal life, the former Youngstown State defensive lineman has called actress Catherine Rusoff his teammate for decades. They share daughters Claire and Sophia.
Reid Ewing as Dylan Marshall
Though he spent years as Haley’s on-again, off-again boyfriend, the Good Luck Charlie alum officially joined the fam with the onscreen arrival of their twins. “The best job of my life,” he declared in a 2020 Instagram.
In the years since, he’s appeared in short films Always Come in Second and Nest, but revealed in a September 2024 Instagram Live that he’s officially retired from acting. “It’s been, like, a really long journey for me as an actor,” he shared, “but I definitely feel like it’s time to pull the plug, so to speak, because it’s just like, the whole process of it is, it’s really an unhealthy process.”
