# CFL on "Modern Family"?



## mhammer (Nov 30, 2007)

So we watched an episode of Modern Family last night (forget if it was PVR'd or live) in which the various parents on the show attend a parent-teacher night at their kids' school, but the elder of the group - Jay (Ed O'Neill) - would rather be home watching "his game". At one point, Jay and Phil sneak into the teachers' lounge at the school, and Jay turns on the lounge TV to watch the game. You only saw a few snippets of the game in question, but the first image I saw looked for all the world like the Argos. What the....? Then you see a few more moments and realize its the Argos vs the Als, and there is Ricky Williams, crossing the 50 on his way to the midstripe. Yup, definitely CFL.

Bizarre that so firmly American and mainstream a show would have one of the principle characters obsessing abut a CFL game,but I suppose equally bizarre that they would show a game from 2006 (the only year he played with the Argos, due to an NFL suspension).


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## traynor_garnet (Feb 22, 2006)

My guess is it costs a LOT less to show the CFL clip rather than the NFL clip. Ricky Williams was probably selected to make it look like the NFL.


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## mhammer (Nov 30, 2007)

Nah. You caught maybe a 300msec glimpse of the back of a guy carrying the ball whose jersey said Williams. You'd have to know it was the Argos to know it was Ricky Williams. Would a 2006 game cost less than the same snippets of a 2013 game? I doubt it, though I might be wrong.

It was just one of those little Easter eggs that I imagine may be because someone in either the crew or cast has a connection to Toronto or Canada in general.


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## hardasmum (Apr 23, 2008)

Most shots like that are purchased from Stock Footage suppliers. Cheap generic shots of sporting events, city streets, famous landmarks.

No hidden meanings or in-jokes, generally speaking.


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## zontar (Oct 25, 2007)

There are a couple of Columbo episodes involving football teams & owners--in one of them they use footage of the Saskatchewan Roughriders and the S on the helmet is no longer for Saskatchewan, but for Stallions.
The episode includes footage of a game with the Eskimos.

Most likely this was done for financial reasons.


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## bw66 (Dec 17, 2009)

traynor_garnet said:


> My guess is it costs a LOT less to show the CFL clip rather than the NFL clip.


I believe that this is true - it was my first thought when I saw it.



mhammer said:


> It was just one of those little Easter eggs that I imagine may be because someone in either the crew or cast has a connection to Toronto or Canada in general.


I hope that this is true.


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## mhammer (Nov 30, 2007)

I was mentioning this incident to someone on the busride into work today, and they suggested it might have been done so that the characters would not appear to have any favoured teams that would be instantly recognizable by the majority of the audience. Actually a pretty plausible idea. That it likely came with a smaller price tag only sweetens the pot.


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## hardasmum (Apr 23, 2008)

mhammer said:


> I was mentioning this incident to someone on the busride into work today, and they suggested it might have been done so that the characters would not appear to have any favoured teams that would be instantly recognizable by the majority of the audience. Actually a pretty plausible idea. That it likely came with a smaller price tag only sweetens the pot.



We (that work in post production) can only refer to teams by their city name. Team names and their logos are trademarked and as such would require clearance and a fee would have to be paid out. 

As mentioned before this footage is sourced from royalty free stock footage companies. It's not impossible that a Canuck in visual FX found some footage of a Canadian game while sourcing shots and chose that footage to use but it ultimately comes down to cost.

http://www.gotfootagehd.com/popular_search/football?page=1


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## NB_Terry (Feb 2, 2006)

Ha ha, I noticed this on the show as well.


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## traynor_garnet (Feb 22, 2006)

Looks like my answer was Whooopy Goldberg for the win!


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