Ariel Winter knows how to make a fashion statement. The 19-year-old actress has received backlash for her revealing outfits and Instagram photos on numerous occasions, but she never shies away from shutting down the haters. Her Modern Family costars have her back, too.
“Ariel is such a strong woman,” Rico Rodriguez exclusively told Us Weekly at UCLA Mattel Children’s Hospital’s Party on the Pier benefit in Santa Monica on Sunday, November 5. “Anything she does, she puts her mind to it. She’ll do the best that she can. … We’re there for her regardless of anything.”
Winter is independent, too. According to Rodriguez, 19, his costar doesn’t ask for advice: “She’s pretty well off on her own!”
Nolan Gould echoed similar sentiments. “People always come up to me and they’re like, ‘Does Ariel come to you for advice or does she come seek solace?’” he recently told Us at the Pediatric AIDS Foundation’s A Time for Heroes event in Los Angeles. “She doesn’t need me. … She knows exactly who she is, and she’s very passionate about this. I don’t think there’s anything anybody could say that would make her second-guess herself in that way.”
Gould, also 19, also said he doesn’t offer tips to the Sofia the First voice actress because he is “not proud” of his own body. “I have a dad bod,” he quipped. “It’s OK, dad bods are in right now.”
For her part, Winter isn’t fazed by her critics. “I went through a lot of hate online, so I tried to change myself for a really long time. But people just kept hating on me no matter what I did,” she told Refinery29 in May. “I decided that instead of pleasing these other people, I’ll just spend that time pleasing myself. Those people are going to be rude to me regardless of what I do, so I should just try and be happy with what I am.”
For access to all our exclusive celebrity videos and interviews – Subscribe on YouTube!
