'America's Got Talent' wins the prime-time ratings race - Los Angeles Times
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‘America’s Got Talent’ Season 16 premiere wins the prime-time ratings race

Howie Mandel with singers attired in white shirts and blue jeans
Howie Mandel poses with the Northwell Nurse Choir on “America’s Got Talent” on NBC.
(Tyler Golden/NBC)
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The top ranked program during the first full week of prime-time television’s summer season was NBC’s “America’s Got Talent,” one of two programs to average more than 6 million viewers.

The 16th season premiere of the NBC series averaged 7.372 million viewers, according to live-plus-same-day figures released Tuesday by Nielsen.

An edition of the CBS newsmagazine “60 Minutes” with repeats of three previously broadcast segments that were updated for Sunday’s broadcast was second, averaging 7.064 million viewers.

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The highest ratings scripted program between May 31 and Sunday was the fourth-season finale of the action drama “Station 19,” fifth for the week, averaging 4.903 million viewers. The 17th season finale of the medical drama “Grey’s Anatomy” that followed on ABC finished second among scripted programs and seventh overall, averaging 4.759 million.

The biggest audience for a sporting event and cable’s rating winner was TNT’s coverage of the sixth and final game of the NBA first-round playoff series between the Lakers and Phoenix Suns that averaged 4.531 million viewers, ninth for the week.

Univision’s coverage of Sunday’s CONCACAF Nations League final between Mexico and the United States was second among the week’s prime-time sporting events and first among Spanish-language programming, averaging 3.923 million viewers, 16th overall.

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In a week that mixed a substantial amount of alternative programming with reruns and some first-run scripted programming, CBS was first, averaging 3.32 million viewers for its prime-time programming.

ABC edged NBC, 3.17 million-3.16 million for second. Fox was fourth among English-language broadcast networks, averaging 1.65 million viewers.

The CW was fifth among the five major English-language broadcast networks, averaging 460,000 viewers.

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ABC’s biggest draw was the seventh-season premiere of “Celebrity Family Feud,” which was third for the week, averaging 5.741 million viewers for a matchup between the families of actors Rob Lowe and Terrence Howard.

Fox’s ratings leader was “Fox Saturday Baseball,” 53rd among the week’s broadcast and cable programs for its regionalized coverage of three games, including one between the Dodgers and Atlanta Braves, that averaged 2.678 million viewers.

The CW’s superhero drama “Superman & Lois,” which averaged 1.237 million viewers, had its highest ranking, tying for 125th among broadcast programs with a 1964 episode of “The Andy Griffith Show” which aired on Me TV. Its overall rank was not available.

There were two series premieres on the five major English-language broadcast networks. The NBC game show “Small Fortune” averaged 1.472 million viewers, 71st among broadcast programs. The Fox animated comedy “Housebroken” averaged 994,000 viewers, 101st among broadcast programs. The overall ranks for both programs were not available.

TNT’s NBA playoff coverage made it the top ranked cable network for the second consecutive week, averaging 2.357 million viewers. Fox News Channel was second for the second consecutive week following eight consecutive first-place finishes, averaging 1.953 million viewers. HGTV was third, averaging 1.254 million viewers.

The top 20 cable programs consisted of 10 NBA playoff games on TNT, seven Fox News Channel programs — four broadcasts of “Tucker Carlson Tonight” and three of “Hannity” — two broadcasts of the MSNBC news and opinion program “The Rachel Maddow Show,” and one NBA playoff game on ESPN.

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“The Mitchells vs. the Machines” topped the weekly list of the programs on the four streaming services whose viewership figures are announced by Nielsen, with viewers spending 853 million minutes watching the Netflix computer-animated science fiction comedy film between May 3-9, its first full week of release.

Viewership was up 65.3% from the previous week when viewers spent 516 million minutes watching it during its first three days of release, ninth for the week.

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