Ratings Watch: Tie For Last Place
When is the top ten not the top ten? When it’s both the top 9 and top 11.
1. American Idol (Tue) — 19.2/28 (rating/share)
2. American Idol (Wed) — 15.9/24
3. Desperate Housewives — 13.5/20
4. CSI: Miami — 13.0/21
5. 60 Minutes — 11.0/17
6. Two and A Half Men — 10.5/15
7. Deal or No Deal (Mon) — 9.8/15
7. The Unit — 9.8/14
9. Grey’s Anatomy — 9.7/16
9. Lost — 9.7/14
9. Old Christine — 9.7/14
Oh, you should have been around in the old days, when there were just 3 networks and those numbers would have been grounds for cancellation. Still, today it’s pretty nice, those three ninth places.
CBS wins the week and season-to date, followed by FOX, ABC and NBC (tie), UPN and WB. WB behind UPN again! Julia Louis-Dreyfuss bangs another nail into the coffin of the Seinfeld Curse; DEAL OR NO DEAL chugs along - I mention this solely because I know that Howie Mandel hangs out often at a local Starbucks and I want to give a shout out. Call me, Howie!
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Howie did better than Michael Eisner, whose talk show CONVERSATIONS WITH MICHAEL EISNER premiered on CNBC Tuesday just after a rerun of the game show and retained a little less than a fifth of the audience. The guest was Martha Stewart, who had a rocky ride of her own on NBC recently. These two are rumored to be the meanest people in showbiz; presumably they have already taken out a contract on Mandel.
Reviews were not kind to Eisner but the pilot episode always sucks; if you read this on a regular basis you may be the primary audience for CONVERSATIONS. And I want you to watch it because if he’s successful as a talk-show host he may not want to go back to production, where he would ruin everyone’s lives.