This Is Us Reunion: Milo Ventimiglia supports TV kids at USC graduation
Milo Ventimiglia, Niles Fitch and Hannah Zeile. Photo: HANNAH ZEILE/INSTAGRAM
Though This Is Us took its final bow in 2022, Milo Ventimiglia is still showing up for his TV children!
On Tuesday, May 21, the actor, 46, supported his former co-star and onscreen son, Niles Fitch (Randall Pearson), as he graduated from the University of Southern California alongside his onscreen daughter, Hannah Zeile (Kate Pearson).
In a photo shared to his Instagram Stories, the trio posed for a candid picture. Fitch could be seen in his graduation attire and looking off into the distance while Ventimiglia stared back with a serious expression. Zeile, on the other hand, smiled for the photo.
Zeile also shared a snap from the festivities to her Instagram Stories — this time the group proudly smiled for the picture as Ventimiglia held Fitch's diploma behind his back.
"Congratulations @nilesfitch," she captioned the post alongside a series of emojis that included a graduation cap, a bottle of champagne, two fingers crossed, and a red heart.
*This Is Us* aired on NBC from September 2016 to May 2022. The family drama centred on the lives of siblings Kevin (Justin Hartley), Kate (Chrissy Metz), and Randall (Sterling K. Brown) and their parents Rebecca (Mandy Moore) and Jack (Ventimiglia). The series used multiple timelines, showing stories that took place in the present as well as flashbacks to the siblings’ childhood and flash-forwards to later years.
While Ventimiglia continues to perform his duties as a doting television dad off-screen, the actor previously revealed how his real-life father informed his portrayal of Jack Pearson on *This Is Us*.
"My mom and dad are wonderful people," he said during a February 2023 appearance on The View. "My father and Jack Pearson were of the same era, both born in the 1940s, both Vietnam vets, and I saw in Jack the way that my father was with my sisters and I."
"What I also saw was an opportunity with the way he was to just kind of be a version of my dad and the big three were actually me," he added. "So I think anything I was doing was kind of just looking up to my dad."
To help him get into the right mindset of a caring, strong dad, Ventimiglia shared that he kept a sweet memento of his own father on set.
"In my trailer, I had a photo of my dad and I when I was a little kid and it said 'be a good husband, be a good father,'" the actor said. "And I was just like, look at that every day and you're there."