It doesn't need a consistent 7:30pm time. EastEnders has 7:30pm and 8pm starts and does fine. The Thursday 8:30pm episodes have actually outrated the Friday 7:30pm episodes on more weeks this year - out of 21 weeks from January-May, the Thursday episodes had more viewers on 11 of the weeks.


I'm sure Wednesday will return in a few years if/when ITV drops its football contracts.


Let's wait and see, shall we...


Let's look at the averages of the non-Monday episodes from January-May:

Thursday 8:30pm: 9.42m
Friday 7:30pm: 9.51m
Friday 8:30pm: 9.31m

How can you say the Thursday episodes are doing as badly as you claim, when its ratings are nearly identical to how the Friday 7:30pm episode have been rating? I think when we look at the overnights, people compare the ratings to EastEnders, and as they're lower most weeks people call its ratings "poor". But relative to how Corrie does for most non-Mondays, the Thursday episodes have rated perfectly fine and are within the normal range. Of course, they're down on how the Wednesday episodes used to do but the ratings are okay compared to the other non-Monday eps.


Just because more viewers are available at a later time, doesn't mean that a programme will automatically get more viewers. Corrie had that Wednesday 7:30pm slot for almost 50 years so understandably its ratings and shares were higher in that slot.


7% drop isn't as bad as you were making it sound like before. The shares have clearly dropped, but like you said yesterday, ITV and the advertisers mostly care about the raw numbers who watch it (bums on seats). The shares for soaps usually drop as you go later in the evening anyway - look at EastEnders whose best shares are usually on Tuesdays and Thursdays when it's at 7:30pm.

PJMillar, I dont purely see things from a business viewpoint. There are some here that possibly do in my opinion but I wouldnt say I do. You accused me of this purely because I said the X Factor results should stay on a Sunday. That is surely the best decision. The moving of the results show to Sunday was the best idea ITV schedulers have had for years and the increase in ratings prove that. That is despite my own dislike for the reliance of Cowell for ITV.

The problem I have, as Rzt has pointed, you keep changing ideas every month or so. I cant take seriously any of your points because they contradict your ideas from the last weeks schedule, so it seems to me you just change your ideas based on whatever struggling show is the focus in this thread.

The underlining problem for ITV is that they have too many slots to fill and not enough decent programming. Moving popular shows around wont fix that.

Of course shows succeed without a big lead-in. But it undoubtedly helps when used properly. The BGT lead-in was wasted when used on The Prisoner which did as badly as anything that got a Corrie lead-in. Obviously leading in to some cop chase show isn't going to appeal hugely to the Corrie audience but leading into an original drama or a drama repeat, then I think it does make a difference. And I could see Paul O'Grady doing well with that audience.

There does still need to be some effort to commission decent shows. Michael Winner's Dancing Stars could have any lead-in it wanted but it was never going to be a hit.

While Corrie might not be as huge as it once was, it's still 3 times more viewers than anything else ITV are going to stick in to fill the 8.30pm slot.

But a high share means that a programme's figures are more impressive.

How much has the share dropped, do you know?

The idea of moving Coronation Street over to Sundays seems pointless to me. ITV need it on Thursdays far more than Sundays to hold up the rest of the schedule. In any case on average Sunday was the lowest rated episode of the week when it was there regularly, and as RZT has just proved the current Thursday episodes are not the lowest rated of the week at the moment.

I do agree though, that if/when Wednesday becomes available again it should move back there.

I think we may have had a hit on our hands if ITV had made Michael Winner a dance teacher.

It's ITV's to win or lose. It can either accept that Corrie can drop 7% of its audience, as rzt thinks is good business, or try to give it a friendlier home.

I think rzt would do very well at ITV...he certainly suits the current ideas that pervade the broadcaster...short-term gain/money, money, money at the expense of a decent long-term structure.

Yeah, obviously a higher share is better. But I doubt ITV expected the Thursday episodes to rate as well share-wise as how the Wednesday episodes used to do. Also the most important thing for ITV is the number of people watching the episode and relatively speaking, it's rating very similar to how the other non-Monday episodes are doing. No, I don't know how much the share has dropped.


I don't think it's 'good' business, I haven't even said that. But since the football moved to Wednesdays, ITV had to move that episode to another night and I reckon scheduled anywhere, it would've lost about that much compared to how the Wednesday episodes used to rate.


Lol no. You've just ignored most of the points I've made about the Thursday episodes rating very similar to how the non-Monday episodes do. I don't know how your idea of moving Corrie to Sunday at 7:30pm would be a decent long-term structure when there's no evidence to suggest it'll rate as well there as it is atm on Thursdays and it would struggle some weeks especially in the Autumn up against a potential Strictly Come Dancing clash. I totally agree with Georged123that moving Corrie around (yet again) won't solve ITV's problems; what they have to do is actually commission decent programmes. A lot of your ideas PJ are poorly thought out, unrealistic, does not take budgets and other factors into account, and aren't consistent. Although in fairness, you have previously made a lot of good points too which I've agreed with.


Yeah, I'm in favour of moving it back to Wednesday when the slot becomes available. But the fact is that near the end of its time on Sundays, the Sunday episodes were often the lowest-rating of the week. The Thursday episodes at the moment are holding up okay relative to the other episodes. Sundays don't even need much of a boost apart from the summer whereas Thursdays would be completely dead if Corrie or Emmerdale weren't there.

That's not true, it's not that often, I've only ever gone for three different formulas.

For example, I still think YBF and HH could work on Fridays, followed by comedy - but I wouldn't risk it personally - these were thoughts/ideas at the time.

Moving a few popular shows around WILL open up new platforms for programmes...

I think my logic with The X Factor is, despite it being very well suited to Sunday, this:-

Reverting to the Saturday split gives ITV a chance to move Harry Hill to the centre of primetime, between 8.30pm an




Your argument makes fundamental sense George, as The X Factor does very, very well on Sundays. But I would love to see Harry Hill with 7-8m every week, as it's top quality and it could really encourage ITV to have faith in more comedy. It's the natural progression for it.

There's something about the Saturday split with X Factor, the event, etc - although I would air four X Factors on Sunday (Boot Camp x2, Judges Houses x2).

Doc Martin could be on the receiving end of Wild at Heart on a Sunday, instead of the

But I'm thinking more '2011. Lets see how this year does first George on Sundays.

It's going to be exciting, this autumn. Will Strictly hold up, or is it in permanent decline? I fear the latter.

Will X Factor improve? I think it will, regardless of whether it remained on Sunday or not...then again Britain's Got Talent didn't do too well this year

First of all, yes the lead-in does mean something - look at how The Bill has slumped by 30% since it lost the lead-in. I reckon a number of ITV's Monday night dramas would do significantly worse without it and it is a real help. Also, look how it boosted Benidorm from 4.5m to 6.5m, and I can see it being very useful for Paul O'Grady this Autumn too. To put it simply, it is useful.

I think they just need to sit tight for now, although swapping Corrie and Emmerdale on Thursdays would help. Other than that, I don't really see the point as Corrie would end up being shunted all over the place, missing weeks and clashing with Strictly Come Dancing. There is no point in ITV moving Corrie around the schedules constantly for the sake of half a million viewers as it just means going round in circles and in this case would lead to the collapse of Thursdays, and they'd have a second Tuesday on their hands.

They need to focus on commissioning good programmes for other slots first before embarking on another soap revamp. the fact that I don't watch Coronation Street is utterly irrelevant to my view on how it should be scheduled, and I don't see what it so wrong with it airing at 8:30pm on Mondays and Fridays. It is a tentpole of the schedule and they need to sort out the rest of it first before shifting Coronation Street. As for PJ's idea of moving The X Factor Results back to Saturday (which he's suggested before too), I can't think of anything much more ludicrous, as X Factor averaged 13.1m (overnights) on Sundays last year, and that includes the audition/bootcamp shows that aired there. They'd have got about 9m there on Saturdays.

So what if ITV move the soaps around for IAC/BGT? It's for 4 weeks a year, I'm sure they can cope.

Oh, and can someone please commission Michael Winner's Dancing Stars?

You're talking about lead-ins PJ - moving The X Factor Results back to Saturday would open the gates for Strictly Results back to Sunday, which means that ITV has one less big lead-in every week with no Sunday for The X Factor.

The mind boggles.

It would also mean that Strictly Results would move back to the 8pm hour, so that ITV would be in the shit position they were in on Sundays in Autumn 2008.

Too true. Also in terms of long-term strategy (which PJ keeps talking about), I would say having X Factor over the weekend is better. With PJ's fantasy idea, only TV Burp would be boosted... the X Factor results would finish too late to launch anything off the back of it. With TXF on Saturdays and Sundays, they get to launch programmes on both days off the back of the X Factor, which can potentially last for years. They'd also have two programmes airing before TXF over the weekend which would be boosted due to people tuning in early. There's so much more to gain in the long-term having the X Factor over two days than one.

TV Burp already gets over 10m on most weekends for ITV1. Whever the Saturday showing has risen the Sunday showing has fallen and vice versa. I really dont think sacrificing millions of viewers and huge sums of revenue from the X Factor to prop up TV Burp, which is already doing great business and has maybe already reached saturation makes sense.

I would love ITV1 to make good comedies too but they seem to be low down of the list of priorities.

Typical Mail.

WDYTYA will increase a bit as (unlike last week) there was no BBC HD simulcast last night.

The BBC HD screening this week is on Thursday at 9.00.

Also in next week's Radio Times Cheryl Taylor, controller of commissioning for comedy at the BBC, was asked why there was not going to be a proper send off episode for Summer Wine (as in its ratings deserved one).

She confirms there are no plans to commission one but they will have a Songs of Praise special covering it instead!

Rather insulting for a record breaking series.

You can't really describe my ideas as this without them being put in place really. We need to just wait and see...

We all have different ideas, and I'm glad that mine are more radical than others. Budgets are taken into account with my scheduling, such as my Friday repeats and cheap programming for Tuesday/Thursday. I've only ever been unrealistic in terms of Champions League idea (which I mentioned once, but you keep bringing up) and maybe The X Factor moving from Sunday's, but I think audience figures will go down this year.

BBC One also needs a bit of a shake up, by buying some rights to midweek football, commissioning more sitcoms and reviving Top of the Pops.

Is it too late for the BBC to pull the plug on series 2? Series 1 bored me to tears.

I remember Last Choir Standing having its recommission aborted.

Isn't it much more important for ITV to get high figures on first showings? So, what I'm trying to say is - financially better for ITV if it got 8m on the Saturday than 10m on Saturday and Sunday?

They could scrap it but I doubt they will as they'll want a new talent show format with Lloyd Webber gone. Series 1 was crap though so I hope serious changes are made.

I wonder why Last Choir Standing had its recommission aborted? Series 1 averaged about 4.5m which is very good for Saturday nights in July so they shuld have done another series.


Not particularly when it's getting 6.5m on Saturdays anyway. It would be pointless considering X Factor woudl drop from 13m to 9-10m.

I think SYTYCD will still go ahead but they'll need a new "head judge" because Nigel won't be there.

It wasn't good, but at least it was better than The One and Only and saves them wheeling out a new talent format every January.

Some updates on ITV Press Centre:

- Biography show 'The Unforgettable...' is taking the Sunday 9pm slot from 8th August. I don't think this'll rate too well but I guess ITV didn't want a drama airing against Sherlock.
- 'Horsepower with Martin Clunes' press pack is released. No date given, but I wouldn't be surprised if it airs on Mondays after Identity finishes.

I actually think that's pretty good scheduling for The Unforgettable... as I agree that they won't want a drama against Sherlock, and it's about Bob Monkhouse so I think it'll get 4m or so, as it'll appeal to the Heartbeat audience. They've only got 2x60 minute episodes of it anyway, the remaining episodes are 30 minutes so I presume those will take a less prominent slot.

Horsepower is a cert for the Monday slot I reckon as there are two Mondays between Identity and August Bank Holiday where U Be Dead will probably air so Horsepower will fit in perfectly. As it's Martin Clunes it'll probably get about 4.5m although WDYTYA may dent it.

About last night, Identity is done now as 3.6m is simply too low. WDYTYA is surprisingly low as it got its lowest rating since it moved to BBC1 except the 3 episodes that aired against new Midsomer last year. Dragons Den clearly dented it, as it held up well considering the move wasn't promoted well at all.

I suppose they'll keep So You Think You Can Dance going for a second series, without Nigel if they can't find away around his US job. I'm not sure they'd have bothered with series 1 without him, though.

I wonder if there'll be a new talent show for next spring, to replace Over the Rainbow-type shows.

Midweek football, won't happen. It's sport budget is already full with F1, Premiership, Six Nations - those 3 being the biggest contracts. Plus, midweek football will piss off Waterloo Road fans as we've already seen this year.

Commissioning more sitcoms I disagree with. Commission sitcoms for BBC Three, yes. Let them grow, be a hit, then move them over, ala. Gavin and Stacey.

Top of the Pops doesn't need reviving. It's the Big Brother argument again, let them rest in peace - don't try and bring back ten times worse 'lookalike' - its really not worth it. OK, keep the Christmas specials, but it really doesn't need to be brought back all year round.

EastEnders did superbly last night. Not a surprise to see WDYTYA? fall as I think the series varies quite significantly based on subject and opposition. On the other hand, I was surprised to see Identity hit the skids - looks like another one's bitten the dust. I wonder if we might see lower figures all round this week as its the first week of school holidays? What do the overall numbers watching TV look like compared to last week?


The BBC really needs to either really commit to it, with the budgets, promotion, studio and run length it needs - or scrap it. The problem is, I bet they'll want to bring Lets Dance back for Comic Relief in March, and you'll wind up with SYTYCD crammed into 7 or 8 weeks again at the start of the year.