In the States for the most part, British television is limited to PBS, and BBC America. There are some exceptions, like Doctor Who, and Primeval on The Sci-Fi Channel, and Hustle on AMC. But for the most part, they'll take a British show, and remake it for their audience, the aformentioned American Idol and Dancing With The Stars being the obvious examples.

Didnt used to be that way. Wasn't The Prisoner & The Avengers shown on mainstream US tv?

UK TV Guide (powered by Digiguide) has been changed and now agrees with the ITV Press Centre, as does itv.com.

Good scheduling for Clunes, but I wish that Billy Connolly's show had also got a Sunday slot as it deserved one, and would have got higher ratings in one.

Dreadful for Hell's Kitchen, but it should bounce back to 3.5-4m tonight.

NBC will be showing Merlin soon, though that's one of those shows/films that could only be made with a British accent.

No surprise for Hells Kitchen last night, I expected it to be much worse, especially when up against The Apprentice. I expect it will be just below 4m tonight.

I'm not sure Ashes to Ashes will affect it greatly- its two completely different audiences imo.

Wednesday 15th April
USA Overnight Ratings

Sorted by adults 18-49 rating

8pm:
FOX - Bones..............................10.76m.....3.0/9.......2.2/8
ABC - Scrubs...............................5.30m.....2.0/7.......2.1/8
CW - America's Next Top Model...3.76m.....1.8/5.......1.9/7
CBS - New Adventures of Old......5.68m.....1.6/5.......0.9/3
NBC - Law and Order...................5.57m.....1.3/4......1.0/4
8.30pm:
ABC - Better Off Ted.....................4.72m.....1.9/6......1.9/6
CBS - Gary Unmarried...................5.87m.....1.8/5......1.0/3

9pm:
FOX - American Idol....................23.49m.....8.0/20.....6.1/18
ABC - Lost.....................................9.01m.....3.9/10....4.0/12
CBS - Criminal Minds...................10.51m.....2.5/6......1.5/4
NBC - Law and Order: SVU...........5.51m.....1.5/4......1.2/3

10pm:
CBS - CSI: New York...................12.01m.....2.8/8......2.0/6
ABC - The Unusuals......................6.21m.....1.9/5......1.7/5
NBC - Law and Order...................5.95m......1.7/5......1.4/4

NETWORKS:
FOX - 5.5/15, 4.2/13 & 17.13m
ABC - 2.6/7, 2.6/8 & 6.74m
CBS - 2.4/7, 1.5/5 & 9.43m
NBC - 1.5/4, 1.2/4 & 5.68m
CW - 1.1/3, 1.2/4 & 2.36m

SOURCE:
Tvbythenumbers

NOTES:
FOX - Trounced the competition again, Idol slightly higher than last week. A rearranged Bones did well in the very weak 8pm slot.
NBC - All episodes of Law and Order were repeats giving it a very poor night and trailing Spanish language Univision in 18-49's.
ABC - Wednesdays still aren't great, 8pm comedies won't return and The Unusuals looks doomed. Lost is the only upside.
CBS - Repeats from 8pm till 10pm which did OK. CSI: NY is the only one of the CSI franchise that doesn't seem to have lost viewers in recent years and is now quite close to CSI: Miami.
CW - Top Model continues to perform well but they give up at 9pm against Idol with a 90210 repeat drawing less than 1m.

Bones did very well and it's airing an extra episode next Monday instead of a House repeat alongside its usual Thursday, it's nice to see FOX cut it some slack.

CSI: NY did very well considering the rest of the lineup was repeats, I think it is the best of the three after CSI and it's better written than CSI: Miami which has the most ludicrous plots for episodes although still enjoyable. CBS would be mad to split it from Criminal Minds.

Hell's Kitchen was much better tonight, so hopefully the ratings will have risen to about 4m.

Its going to be very interesting to see how that does. UK TV does well selling formats to US TV (especially in reality or entertainment - 'unscripted' as the Americans call it). But its a big surprise to see a British drama simply being transmitted as it is on a big four network. I can't imagine it'll succeed, but to be honest, it'd struggle to do much worse than some of NBC's own...

I understand the acquisition was mostly due to a shortage of drama scripts during the writers strike, but it does say something about how desperate NBC are for hits. I doubt any of the other networks, or NBC a couple of years ago for that matter, would have tried this.

How's the JLC show been doing. I really enjoyed the first two episodes but haven't remembered to catch it since, it's quite good for an ITV2 show. I don't expect it to be doing brilliantly but do you think it'll get renewed?

His ratings might pick up a bit now that his lead-in is Katie and Peter's new series. Their shows tend to attract about 1m viewers, making them one of ITV2's highest rated shows.

The thing about Hell's Kitchen is that it isn't the quality of the show, but the quality of the opposition that determines how well it does.

Exactly. It seems to be a show that people will happily tune into if there's nothing else on. I think it might pick up over the next few days but will be hit by Ashes to Ashes again on Monday.

Hell’s Kitchen (Thu) - 3.5m (15%)

So it improved a million on the previous but still disasterous for ITV1!!

Why they brought it back after awful ratings last series i dont know!!

They only had good ratings for the first series cause Gordon Ramsey was the chef!!

I wouldn't call it disasterous, far from it, tbh, as that rating is similar to the last series. It must be fairly cheap to make, and I'd imagine that it does well in the demos (16-34s, in particular).

I have to say I'm usually hooked on all these reality things but not HK and I'm a massive Claudia fan.

I just cant get in to it at all.

ITV's Average Ratings This Week w/ Hells Kitchen [Mon, Weds & Thurs ONLY]
Monday: 5m
Wednesday: 2.5m
Thursday: 3.5m
AVERAGE: 3.66m

ITV's Average Ratings Last Week without Hells Kitchen [Mon, Weds & Thurs ONLY]
Monday: 5.6m
Wednesday: 2.4m
Thursday: 1.8m
AVERAGE: 3.26m

So its doing better than the, quite frankly "ratfest" they pulled out last week.

I felt like that, and I'm not a Claudia fan. However, after an awful first show, it is definately improving, and so is Claudia, and I can see it getting really good in the next few days.

Also, it may have been dented last night by Katie and Peter, which got 989,000 on ITV2, with a further 345,000 on +1. Traffic Cops won the slot with a lower than usual 4.16m, so it looks like everything was down (The Mentalist fell to 2.39m, and My Family only got 4.81m, and is now only 200k ahead of The Bill).

See here for a full roundup.

God i didn't think Katie and Peter would do so well for ITV2. Got 989k with an extra 345k on +1

How is it disasterous? Its a big improvement on what they've been showing lately in the same slot, and the ratings for the first three shows of the last series were:

Show 1- 3.6m
Show 2- 3.4m
Show 3- 4.2m

Average of 3.73m so this series is only slightly down on the last one. There is no reason why it can't slowly crawl back up to 5m for the final just as the last series did.

I'm no expert, but surely what it needs is some controversy and tabloid coverage. If that happens the ratings will pick up.


No word on the UEFA Cup ratings for Machester City vs. Hamburg yet?

Yes, it's doing OK, nothing spectacular, but reasonably well, and seemed to dent The Mentalist. I expect it to get about 3.5m again tonight; perhaps slightly higher due to the lack of competition, and it should win the slot, as there are 3 reality shows on tonight, and I can see people opting for the familiar one (Hell's Kitchen ), particularly with the Coronation Street lead in. It should then break 4m on Saturday (BGT lead in) and maybe again on Sunday.

Last series' full overnights were:

Monday: 3.6m
Tuesday: 3.4m
Wednesday: 4.2m
Thursday: 3.9m
Friday: 3.2m
Saturday: 4.0m
Sunday: 3.2m
Monday: 4.5m
Tuesday: 4.1m
Wednesday: 3.5m
Thursday: 3.9m
Friday: 2.8m
Saturday: 3.8m
Sunday: 3.7m
Monday: 5.6m

AVERAGE: 3.8m


Yes, that's what happened last year, as when Lee Ryan walked out, the ratings rose to 4.2m (Wednesday, week 1), and rose to 4m+ for the Jim Davidson homophobia story (Monday, Tuesday, week 2).

Thursday 16th April 2009
BBC One
13:45 - Doctors - 1.69m (21.5%)
19:30 - EastEnders - 6.23m (28.8%)
20:00 - My Family - 4.81m (21.7%)
20:30 - DIY SOS - 3.8m (16.4%)
21:00 - Traffic Cops - 4.16m (17.6%)

BBC Two
20:00 - Coast - 1.7m (7.5%)
21:00 - Professor Regan's... - 1.67m (7.1%)

ITV1
19:00 - Emmerdale - 5.97m (28.9%)
- 19:00 to 19:30: 6.54m (32.7%)
- 19:30 to 20:00: 5.40m (25.1%)
20:00 - The Bill - 4.59m (20.2%)
21:00 - Hell's Kitchen - 3.54m (15%)
- Up 1.07m on Wednesday

Channel 4
18:30 - Hollyoaks - 1.75m (9.2%)
20:00 - Kirstie's Homemade Home - 2.69m (11.9%) [+1: 230,000 (1%)]
21:00 - Missing: Race Against Time - 1.48m (6.3%) [+1: 170,000]
22:00 - Around The World In 80 Trades - 966,000 [inc +1]

five
17:30 - Neighbours - 1.34m (9.4%)
18:00 - Home and Away - 1.04m (6%)
20:00 - I Own Britain's Best Home - 765,000 (3.4%)
21:00 - The Mentalist - 2.39m (10.1%)
- Down 540,000 on last week

BBC Three
22:00 - EastEnders - 1.44m (7.8%)

ITV2
21:00 - Katie & Peter: Stateside - 989,000 (4.6%) [+1: 345,000 (2.1%)]

E4
19:00 - Hollyoaks - 592,000 (3.4%) [+1: 89,500 (0.4%)]
21:00 - My Name Is Earl - 482,000 [inc +1]
21:30 - The Big Bang Theory - 571,800 [inc +1]
22:00 - The Inbetweeners - 781,000 (4.3%) [+1: 311,400]
- Down 177,000 on Episode #1.... hmm, but the +1 figure looks quite good!

Film4 [inc +1]
18:45 - Tales From Earthsea - 124,400
21:00 - Borat: Cultural Learnings Of... - 282,900

More4 [inc +1]
21:00 - ER - 640,000 (2.7%)
22:00 - Brothers & Sisters: Lost And Found - 201,700

fiver
18:30 - Home and Away - 590,000 (3.5%)
19:00 - Neighbours - 196,000 (1.1%)

Primetime Shares
BBC One - 20.4% (last week: 21.2%)
ITV1 - 18.8% (16.8%)
Channel 4 - 7% (6.5%)
BBC Two - 6.5% (7.2%)
five - 5.7% (6.8%)
Multichannel - 41.6% (41.5%)

Source: Channel 4 Sales, DS (1), (2)

Here's a question for folks. Will the combined audience for ITV2 (Katie & Peter), 3 (Taggart) and 4 (Man City vs. Hamburg) @ 9pm beat the audience for Hells Kitchen on ITV1 at 9pm?