NEW YORK — In Milo Ventimiglia’s trailer on the set of NBC’s “This is Us” hangs a black-and-white photo of himself at maybe 3 or 4, leaning on his dad’s knee, father and son smiling in the front yard near a tall tree.
Above and below the snapshot are handwritten signs, reminders that have helped the actor mold his popular character, Papa Jack Pearson, on one of network TV’s weepiest family shows of the moment:
“Be a Good Father,” Ventimiglia penned above, with “Be a Good Husband” below.
“I saw my mom and dad with a great, great healthy marriage,” said Ventimiglia, neither father nor husband himself.
“I think I would absolutely love to have that, have a family, have a wife, have a partner. You think about who is that one person that you’re going to be with that you can just walk shoulder-to-shoulder with in life, support, and they support you, you know,” he added in a recent interview.