‘Family’ is domestic bliss with a modern twist

September 23, 2009|Television review, Matthew Gilbert, Globe Staff

Pop cultural anthropologists dig sitcoms. Oddly enough, those harmless, sometimes grating slivers of mass entertainment can double as valuable artifacts. Scrape off the contrivances and zany punch lines, and you can see shifting and conflicting social definitions at play. When it comes to family sitcoms, you find old-fashioned gender roles in “Make Room for Daddy,’’ a blended fantasy on “The Brady Bunch,’’ gay-straight coupling on “Will & Grace,’’ and workplace kin on “30 Rock’’ - all somehow reflective of the fears and wishes of their time.

So what does ABC’s truly enjoyable new “Modern Family,’’ a comic look at three clans, divulge about the American family circa 2009? Hard to say exactly - something about the particularity of each family unit as uniformity fades away and nuclear, blended, gay, and interracial families all coexist in suburbia It’s not just the cities that are diverse anymore, the show implies. But really, it’s too early to take a big-picture look at “Modern Family,’’ which premieres at 9 p.m. on Channel 5, even while the title practically demands cultural analysis.

It’s not too early, however, to heap praise onto this astute, well-written show and its many specific wonders. “Modern Family’’ follows a “traditional’’ family (mom, dad, three kids), a gay male couple with a baby, and an older man with his younger Latina wife and her 11-year-old son. The show is structured as a mockumentary group portrait, which, contrary to common belief, was not invented by the makers of “The Office.’’ The mockumentary has wended in and out of vogue, with 1984’s “This Is Spinal Tap,’’ with the Christopher Guest movies, with Tim Robbins’s “Bob Roberts’’ in 1992. It’s a great way to play absurdity off of mundane reality, and it has extra zing these days, as a scripted take on reality TV.

Phil (Ty Burrell) and Claire (Julie Bowen) are the mom and dad dealing with TV’s more familiar parenting issues. Phil, played with perfect dorkiness by Burrell, is obsessed with appearing hip. His kids are horrified as he misuses hip-hop lingo, reenacts the dances from “High School Musical,’’ and explains that “WTF’’ stands for “Why the Face.’’ He’s so bent on being liked, he can’t discipline them. He is the most “Office’’-like element in “Modern Family,’’ a home variation on Steve Carell’s Michael Scott.