The classic sitcom family is about to get a makeover.Modern Family, the centerpiece of ABC's new two-hour Wednesday comedy block, centers on three clans: a "traditional" family with mom, dad and three kids; a gay male couple who have just adopted a baby; and an older man (played by Married ... With Children's Ed O'Neill) and his much-younger Latina bride with a child of her own.
Family weaves stories about each of the families with mock-documentary "interviews" of them in a format similar to The Office. It isn't groundbreaking, but it reinvents a genre largely absent from network TV, where sitcoms have lately centered on groups of buddies and sex jokes.
Many of the situations in this situation comedy came from real life, says executive producer Christopher Lloyd. "Seventy-five percent of our stories are triggered by something that happened to us or writers in the room."
A fun surprise is that the pilot episode veers between the three separate family stories, revealing only at the end that they are connected: O'Neill's character is the father of Bowen's Claire and Jesse Tyler Ferguson's Mitchell, one of the gay dads.
The network's research revealed viewers would be more inclined to watch if they knew the show was about one big family rather than three separate ones, so promo spots airing for the last several weeks have already spoiled the surprise.
That "robs us of what we consider one of the greatest moments in the pilot, and that's a particularly tough thing for us to adjust to," Lloyd says. "We're not thrilled about it, but we fully understand why they're doing it."
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