NEWSMAKERS

NEWSMAKERS

CBS’ ‘Blue Bloods’ defies traditions

NEW YORK

The success of the family police show “Blue Bloods,” which was CBS’ most popular drama on the air last week, has defied the traditional rules of television.

“Blue Bloods” airs Friday night, which for many years has been considered a television graveyard because broadcasters figure potential viewers are out on the town instead of in their living rooms.

Networks usually program accordingly, keeping their highest-profile shows on other nights.

“Blue Bloods,” which stars Tom Selleck as a New York City police commissioner and patriarch of a crime-fighting family, has defied the odds. It’s the most popular Friday night scripted series in more than a decade.

In its fourth season, the show’s ratings are up 4 percent over last year, the Nielsen company said.

For the week of April 21-27, the top 10 shows, their networks and viewerships: “The Big Bang Theory,” CBS, 16.44 million; “Dancing With the Stars,” ABC, 14.06 million; “The Voice” (Tuesday), NBC, 11.29 million; “The Black List,” NBC, 11.24 million; “The Voice” (Monday), NBC, 11.19 million; “Blue Bloods,” CBS, 11.05 million; “60 Minutes,” CBS, 10.44 million; “NCIS,” CBS, 10.4 million; “NCIS: Los Angeles,” CBS, 10.18 million; “The Millers,” CBS, 9.96 million.

Rapper Meek Mill: Race led to police stop

PHILADELPHIA

When Hurricane Sandy canceled flights out of New York on Halloween night 2012, Philadelphia rapper Meek Mill booked a private jet out of his hometown for the Atlanta launch party of his debut album, “Dreams & Nightmares.”

But he and his entourage never made the $22,500 charter flight. Instead, Mill and three others, including a senior vice president of the Warner Brothers music label, were arrested and detained for about 10 hours after a North Philadelphia traffic stop triggered by the darkly tinted windows of their Range Rover SUV.

“In neighborhoods like where I come from, four black males in a car, ... we’re always being asked to be searched,” the 26-year-old Philadelphia entertainer testified Monday, the first day of trial in his civil-rights lawsuit against city police. “All I was doing that night was going to work and doing what I had to do.”

Mill, whose real name is Robert Williams, believes they were stopped for being black. He refused to let police search the vehicle. The city argues that police, and a trained dog, smelled marijuana in the car. However, no drugs were found and no charges filed.

Meek puts his losses at $67,000 for the flight, lost appearance fee and extra car rental fee, along with lost income from a lower-than-expected Puma contract.

Associated Press