Ed O'Neill (top), Sofia Vergara and Rico Rodriguez star in the TV series Modern Family. The ABC comedy series features an extended family in which O'Neill is married to a younger woman (Vergara).

Okay, Ed O'Neill, we have a question for you:

Why do the TV characters you play always have so much trouble with women?

"Because everybody does, don't they!" said O'Neill, sparking laughter.

True, but you seem to take the hit for all heterosexual males.

"That's right," O'Neill said. "I just think there's a lot of comedy in there."

Indeed, there's a lot of comedy in O'Neill's new series Modern Family, which debuts tonight on ABC and Citytv.

O'Neill, of course, forever will be remembered as Al Bundy, the lead character in the long-running sitcom Married ... with Children. O'Neill plays a patriarch again in Modern Family, but structurally speaking, O'Neill's new clan is far more complex than the Bundys ever were.

Modern Family focuses on three distinct family units: A traditional mom and dad with three kids; a same-sex couple that has just adopted a baby; and an older man married to a much younger woman, both of whom are on their second marriages. The younger woman has brought her sensitive 11-year-old son from her first marriage into the mix.

As you might have guessed, O'Neill plays Jay, a.k.a., the older man.

"For me, it's very funny that this guy obviously wasn't very good at his first marriage, and that was an American woman who he never could figure out," said O'Neill, 63. "Now he is with this Colombian woman, for obvious reasons when he met her. But now he's trying to figure out this woman, which is like, good luck. So he really is in over his head."

Jay's hot young Colombian wife, Gloria, is played by the curvaceous Sofia Vergara -- or maybe that should be Sofia Viagra. Gloria's son Manny is played by Rico Rodriguez.

"With the kid, Manny, that's a big problem, because Jay already has a gay adult son," O'Neill said. "Jay doesn't want Manny to have the same problems that maybe his son did when he was in school. He's trying to shield Manny and often makes the wrong call, says the wrong things, because he's not really good at being a father.

"Jay is trying, but obviously he's not going to win any fatherhood awards."

Hey, neither did Al Bundy, and that show ran for more than a decade.

When O'Neill referred to Jay already having a gay adult son, that actually is the hook to Modern Family: Those three distinct family units we mentioned previously are connected and form an extended family.

ABC initially asked critics not to reveal that part when the Modern Family pilot was screened last June, but the network subsequently changed its strategy, going so far as to confirm the wider clan in public promo clips for the show.

The thinking, we imagine, was that the acknowledgement of a wider connection makes the ensemble show more attractive and easy to wrap your brain around heading into it.

By the way, O'Neill said he still catches Married ... with Children reruns on TV from time to time.

"I channel-surf like most people," O'Neill said. "I have my favourite episodes. If it's one I like, I'll watch it. I don't watch them all."

O'Neill's daughter on Married ... with Children was played by Christina Applegate, who until earlier this year had a sitcom on ABC, too.

"Of course, I called Christina to congratulate her that I'd be on the same network," O'Neill said. "And then they cancelled her show."

Well, hopefully the funny and edgy Modern Family will stick around a little longer than Samantha Who? did.