We’re just an ordinary family, living in your town (but don’t worry!)….we like monster trucks and football, even though we’re brown (we hate curry!) So welcome to our clan, we promise there’s no plan….to change the way you live or how you pray. Cause we’re just here to obey! Your various laws and local ordinances.

That's the opening theme music to the new web series, "Halal in the Family," created and starring Daily Show correspondent Aasif Mandvi. In front of a packed audience Thursday night at WNYC's Greene Space, Mandvi and his team premiered two episodes of the new series. 

"This all started about 5 years ago when Katie Couric said ... 'maybe what American Muslims need is their own Cosby Show,'" Mandvi said to which producer Miles Kahn replied, "And we took it literally."

Mandvi and his team went on to create a sitcom that depicted the all-American Muslim family, but without the over-the-top depictions of Muslims that they felt were being otherwise delivered by Hollywood and the mainstream media. At first, they named the show "The Qu'osby Show." But when the Bill Cosby controversy took over headlines, they changed the name to "Halal in the Family." (Get it?) 

The idea behind the show is simple - short, pithy episodes that "use comedy as a way to talk about issues" says Mandvi. And while the show has been well received, according to Mandvi, there have some some viewers who expected to see more extreme depictions of Muslims. 

"There should be an Uncle Rahim in the basement goat herding with an AK-47," Mandvi remembers one early viewer saying after watching the show. "Then it would be more believable." 

But it's precisely those portrayals the show is combating head on. And just like Norman Lear was able to do in the hit '70s sitcom "All in the Family," Mandvi wants to bring up some tough issues - from Islamophobia to FBI surveillance - and put them front in center of American TV screens (or computer screens). 

"It's not different than what Jews have done in Hollywood or black people or gay people," said Kahn who is Jewish. "Get them into people's living rooms and say, 'hey these people are just like you.'" 

The series premiered Thursday (April 9) as an exclusive web series on Funny or Die, with the first four episodes made available.

To watch a discussion between Aasif Mandvi, Miles Kahn and comedian Dean Obeidallah, listen to the audio above, or check out the video below: