I've been so busy checking Modern Family for homophobic subtexts with Adam Devine that I missed a gay subtext in Episode 5.13, "Three Dinners":
Modern Family has a very large cast: closet-making tycoon Jay Pritchett; his new wife Gloria and her son; daughter Claire and her husband and three children; and son Mitchell and his partner, eventually husband. Episodes usually ssend smaller groups out on separate adventures, so I'll cover the three dinners separately.
Dinner 1: Jay and Gloria are dining with their close friends, Shorty (Chazz Palminteri, who has appeared in four previous episodes) and his wife. They've been taking Spanish classes, because they're moving to Costa Rica! They expect Jay and Gloria to be happy for them, but Jay immediately becomes critical: "You hate humidity! They have mosquitos the size of your fist!"
Cut to Shorty and Jay playing pool, Jay still complaining about the move: "It's a terrible idea. You get into things without thinking, and then you need me to come and rescue you!" They argue about a lot of things from their never-mentioned-before shared history, and finally break up.
Gloria and her son Manny advise Jay that he always pushes his friends away, so when they leave him, it doesn't hurt as much. Aww, you don't want to open yourself up to love. Wait, what about Gloria?
"You're the greatest generation," Manny says, "But you can't feel."
Jay lashes out with a facetious accusation that Manny and Gloria are lovers, an incest joke playing into the homophobic slur that all gay men are in love with their mothers. He keeps playing on it until the viewers are cringing: "Why don't you two go cuddle!"
Later, we see Jake sitting in the kitchen, getting drunk and thinking about how much Shorty means to him. Finally he decides to drive over and apologize -- dude, you're drunk -- but Shorty beats him to it. They hug and cry. Gloria, eavesdropping, snits: "This is a little girlier than I thought." Wait, first you criticize him for not displaying emotion, and now you criticize him for displaying emotion. Make up your mind, lady!
More dinners after the break
Dinner #2: Jay's son Mitchell and his boyfriend Cam are in a fancy restaurant, having a romantic dinner to "reconnect/." They try to find something to talk about besides their upcoming wedding and daughter Lily, but come up empty. They end up reading aloud about current events on their phones. But they have a lot to talk about with Katie from the next table, including criticizing her husband Brandon (Eddie McClintock, top photo) for not sharing his food.
When Katie goes to the bathroom, Brandon tells them to knock it off; he needs some space so he can propose. The guys get all excited and want to help. Remember, they've never met before. They just happen to have chosen a restaurant where the tables are two inches apart.
Whoops, Katie turns him down! She doesn't want to get married, and turn into "one of those couples with nothinig to talk about until they glom on to other people." Hint, hint. Brandon rushes off to cry, and the guys defend themselves: "We have a lot to talk about." Then they advise her that sometimes relationships involve compromises, annoyances, and...well, boredom.
Brandon returns. Katie still doesn't want to marry him: "I want the kind of relationship those guys have." Someone you can be bored with? She leaves. The guys continue to butt in: "She's kind of trampy, not very bright, and way older than you."
Of course, at that moment, she returns, willing to marry Brandon after all. She rejected you twice, dude, Stay dumped! , The guys have learned their lesson, and rush out without comment.
Dinner #3: Jay's daughter Claire and her husband Phil ttake their college-age daughter Haley out to dinner to discuss her lack of direction. Brian (Tony Cavalero), their server, takes their order for mojitos, they discuss how cute he is. "I'd kill to have those lips on me," Phil says. Then: "I mean, I want his lips on my mouth." A running gag on this show has Phil saying or doing things that sound like he is gay.
When Brian to return with their mojitos, Phil and Claire want to demonstrate that most people Haley's age have their lives charted out, so they ask about his plans for the future. After work, he plans to watch a movie and get high. "Why, are you looking for something to do?" He invites them to come along, looking directly at Phil. No, Phil says, "That's not gonna happen." Farther in the future, he wants to be a screenwriter.
Brian returns a third time to give them the check (I guess they had dinner at some point, too.) . So,in three scenes, two iinclude jokes implying that Phil is attracted to him.
What's love got to do with it: The three plotlines are thematically linked by depictions of relationships threatened by petty disagreements: Jay-Shorty, Mitch-Cam, and Phil/Claire - Haley.
What's homophobia got to do with it: The positive gay relationship of Mitch and Cam is bookended by Gloria's disapproval of Jay's "girly" same-sex friendship and Phil's embarrassment over his kissing-Brian faux-pas, two scenes where same-sex desire is presented as bad, wrong, and weird.
Left: what happens when you google "Chazz Palminteri" and "nude." It's actually Mike Guzman.
And when you google "Eddie McClintock" and "nude." I don't know who it is.
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