Glenn Dyer's shorts and TV ratings

Glenn Dyer’s shorts and TV ratings

Bert’s back at Nine Bert Newton’s departure from Ten’s Good Morning Australia and emergence at Nine is yet another twist in Moonface’s long career and for Nine it represents yet another “back to the future” piece of talent management from Sam Chisholm. Although what Kerry Anne Kennerley thinks will be intriguing: after doing the right […]

Crikey

Oct 27, 2005

Bert’s back at Nine

Bert Newton’s departure from
Ten’s Good Morning Australia and emergence at Nine is yet another twist in
Moonface’s long career and for Nine it represents yet another “back to the future” piece of
talent management from Sam Chisholm. Although what Kerry Anne Kennerley thinks will be intriguing: after doing the right
thing for Nine and besting Bert and GMA and giving the Network a growing revenue
stream from 9am to 11am, her efforts are repaid by the Network hiring her
beaten rival! That’s wrong, but these
days that’s Nine.

Last night’s TV
ratings

The Winners	Seven snuck home, while Ten used a repeat of House and shed 300,000 viewers, but still won, yes, you guessed it, the 18 to 39 age group. Home and Away (1.529 million), Today Tonight (1.426 million) and Beyond Tomorrow (1.356 million) were the top three programs nationally, with Nine’s best McLeod’s Daughters (1.351 million) next. That repeat of House was Ten’s best with 1.2 million. The ABC’s best was Spicks and Specks with 1.151 million.
The Losers	Ten in All People, but they won’t really care having won the 18 to 39 group. Merrick and Rosso’s The B Team was under 600,000 viewers again and The Ronnie Johns Half Hour had 403,000. Australian Princess has 872,000 and was big in the tweenie market. A new episode of CSI Miami for Nine attracted 1.253 million. Good, but not a killer blow to Seven’s Blue Heelers with 1.080 million. A new Without a Trace (1.162 million) beat Seven’s Forensic Investigators (1.015 million), but not convincingly. Too many clones of CSI.
News & CA	Seven News and Today Tonight were again winners. Nine News was again under 300,000 viewers in Sydney at 269,000, Seven was watched by 351,000. Today Tonight beat A Current Affair in Sydney by an even bigger margin. Seven News got to within 10,000 of Nine in Melbourne and TT beat ACA, while Nine News and ACA won Brisbane easily. The 7pm ABC News had 1.019 million and The 7.30 Report 918,000.
The Stats	Seven won with a share of 29.3% to 28.2% for Nine, down to 19.9% for Ten, 17.3% for the ABC and 5.3% for SBS. Nine won Brisbane and Adelaide, Seven won Sydney, Melbourne and had a big win in Perth that pushed it home.
Glenn Dyer’s comments	Now when the most popular program is on at 7pm in Home and Away it’s all downhill from then on for the rest of the night. Was it a judgement from viewers that in the absence of a new episode of House, everything else on wasn’t that attractive? Nope, 18 programs had a million or more viewers, so it wasn’t a lack of attractive programs, but quite a few. The ABC’s Spicks and Specks program continues to build, having its biggest audiences by far last night. There were 400,000 viewers between Home and Away and Temptation. Nine research and management don’t much like Ed Phillips it seems, and nor do viewers. Lavinia Nixon does test well. Tonight, Nine should do well with 20 to1 and RPA plus Getaway, maybe enough to win and grab back the week’s lead held by Seven.