powered by FreeFind

Apple iTunes

Archives

Local Nielsen ratings snapshot (Tues., May 22) -- Idol, Glee, Dancing set pace

By ED BARK
@unclebarkycom
ABC's Dancing with the Stars spring season finale drew Tuesday's biggest crowd while Fox had the demographic darlings.

The Green Bay Packers' Donald Driver added a Mirror Ball trophy to his Super Bowl ring to the joy and merriment of Uncle Barky and 406,446 D-FW viewers, including 433,542 for the climactic 15 minutes. That allowed DWTS to dominate the 8 to 10 p.m. slot after Fox's next-to-last American Idol installment for the season won the 7 p.m. hour with 392,898 viewers.

Fox also called the 7 to 9 p.m. tune among advertiser-prized 18-to-49-year-olds, with Idol romping before the Glee season finale edged the first hour of DTWS, which easily won from 9 to 10 p.m. in this key measurement.

CBS offered a three-pronged festival of NCIS reruns, but the first two were still potent enough to beat NBC's America's Got Talent in total viewers. NCIS ran a distant fourth all night, though, with 18-to-49-year-olds.

Over on Fox Sports Southwest, the Texas Rangers' late-starting 3-1 win at Seattle averaged 203,223 total viewers.

In Tuesday's local news derby results, WFAA8 again cut away from the DWTS finale faster than sports anchor Dale Hansen can say "No Thank You" to a veggie plate. The station won decisively at 10 p.m. in total viewers, but the overall haul of 270,964 ended up being a sharp drop-off from the 433,542 who watched the 9:45 to 10 p.m. portion of DWTS.

WFAA8 also ran first by a comfy margin among 25-to-54-year-olds, the main advertiser target audience for news programming.

Fox4 likewise ran the table at 6 a.m. while adding 5 and 6 p.m. golds in the 25-to-54 demographic.

WFAA8 won at 5 p.m. in total viewers and CBS11 had the most viewers at 6 p.m.