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Hill Street Blues

Television Programming Landmarks

Hill Street Blues is an American police drama created by Steven Bochco and Michael Kozoll that premiered on NBC in 1981, following the officers and detectives of a fictional urban police precinct through overlapping personal and professional storylines. The series pioneered a serialized, multiple-plot ensemble structure combined with a handheld, documentary-influenced camera style and dense, overlapping dialogue, techniques that were unusual for American network television drama at the time. Hill Street Blues is widely credited by television historians with fundamentally reshaping the structure of the American television drama, directly influencing later ensemble series such as ER, NYPD Blue and The Wire.

Facts
Classification
Original Language
English 1
AwardSourced to the subject's own account
Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Drama Series 2
Release YearSourced to the subject's own account
1981 2
CountrySourced to the subject's own account
United States 2
Connections

In Medium

Source Hill Street Blues (Wikipedia)
In the Other Atlases
Sources
1. Wikidata: Hill Street Blues
Wikidata Q1247241, class allow-list match (w-wdresolver-0926)View the Source
2. Hill Street Blues (Wikipedia)
Wikipedia
  • Lead sentence (release year), en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hill_Street_Blues
    Hill Street Blues is an American serial police procedural television series that aired on NBC in prime-time from January 15, 1981, to May 12, 1987, for 146 episodes.
  • Lead sentence (country), en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hill_Street_Blues
    Hill Street Blues is an American serial police procedural television series that aired on NBC in prime-time from January 15, 1981, to May 12, 1987, for 146 episodes.
  • Hill Street Blues, Description, original language
    Hill Street Blues is an American police drama created by Steven Bochco and Michael Kozoll that premiered on NBC in 1981, following the officers and detectives of a fictional urban police precinct through overlapping personal and professional storylines.
  • Wikipedia: 'four consecutive wins for Outstanding Drama Series'; 26 Emmy Awards total (checked 2026-09-26)
  • In Medium: Television, Article lead sentence
    Hill Street Blues is an American serial police procedural television series that aired on NBC in prime-time from January 15, 1981, to May 12, 1987, for 146 episodes.
View the Source
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