"The Bible," the History Channel's epic new miniseries, posted huge ratings during its premiere last week, and now the show is assembling a celebrity fan base.
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U.S. Sen. Marco Rubio of Florida, LL Cool J, and Los Angeles Angels outfielder Josh Hamilton were just some of the notable names that voiced their support for the Mark Burnett-produced series on Twitter after Sunday night's second installment.
Oprah Winfrey even live tweeted her reactions as the episode aired.
On "The Bible's" March 3 debut, 13.1 million tuned in, according to Nielsen, more than double the viewership for the two-hour season premiere of Donald Trump's "Celebrity Apprentice" the same night. Trump's show had 5 million viewers during the 9 p.m. hour on NBC.
The millions who tuned in during the initial broadcast made "The Bible" the No. 1 entertainment telecast of the year on cable TV.
The show is divided into five two-hour episodes, and covers Genesis to Revelation with one overarching narrative that includes both the Old and New Testaments.
Burnett and his wife Roma Downey produced the series. Downey recently revealed that miracles regularly happened on set during filming.
"The hand of God was on this," Burnett told Entertainment Weekly in January. "There's a scene [where] Jesus says, 'The Holy Spirit is like the wind.' At that moment, a wind, like as if a 747 was taking off, blew his hair, almost blew the set over and sustained for 20 seconds across the desert, and the actors didn't break — they kept going. And everything stopped. Everyone just looked at everyone like, 'What just happened?'"
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