Fox News Vaults To Top Of Primetime Ratings
RNC Addresses Set Course; ESPN Second With College Football
By R. Thomas Umstead -- Multichannel News, 9/10/2008 7:15:00 AM
Who says no one watches political conventions?
Fox News Channel’s coverage of GOP Presidential nominee John McCain’s Sept. 4 acceptance speech at the Republican National Convention drew 9.2 million viewers, topping all other basic cable shows last week, according to Nielsen Media Research data. All told, McCain's moment was the most-watched convention coverage ever, drawing 38.9 million viewers between cable and broadcast outlets.
Coming in a close second for cable was Fox News’s Sept. 3 airing of the highly anticipated speech from Republican vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin, which drew 9.0 million viewers. The GOP acceptance speeches ranked as the third- and fourth-most-watched shows in the network’s history.
The acceptance addresses from St. Paul also marked the second week in a row that political programs were cable’s most- viewed shows: CNN’s 8 million viewers for its coverage of Democratic presidential nominee Barack Obama’s Aug. 28 address in Denver topped all shows during the last week of August.
Fox News Channel -- repeating its 2004 performance, defeated all broadcast and cable competition during the three nights of the RNC from St.Paul -- was the most-watched network in primetime for the week of Sept. 1 through Sept. 7, averaging a 3.2 household rating and 3.04 million viewers, according to Nielsen Media Research.
ESPN, riding the strong performance of two primetime college football telecasts, finished second with a 2.2 rating and 2.16 million viewers on average.
This year’s leader USA Network (2.1 and 2.02 million) dropped into a third-place tie with TNT (2.1 and 2.07 million). Boosted by the RNC, CNN was knotted with Disney Channel with a 1.9 rating and 1.85 million and 1.79 million viewers on average, respectively. MSNBC, embattled with the demotion of convention anchors Chris Matthews and Keith Olbermann, also received a bump from its coverage St, Paul: The service was tied for 20th for the week with a 0.9 mark and 856,000 watchers on average in primetime.
TBS and Nick at Nite were next at 1.5 and 1.46 million and 1.45 million viewers, respectively. Lifted by the 25th annual MTV Video Music Awards on Sept. 7, MTV (1.28 million) and AMC (1.19 milion), completed the top 10, both with a 1.3 rating.
Between the political and football coverage and the VMAs, Lifetime Television, Hallmark Channel and Cartoon Network, typically top 10 players, found themselves displaced from the group last week.
Led by the appearance of pop tart Britney Spears, the silver anniversary VMA event generated 8.4 million viewers to rank as the top ranked entertainment-based show for the week. Spears, a year removed from a disastrous and much publicized performance during the 2007 MTV Video Awards Show, opened this year’s version but did not perform.
TNT’s The Closer (8.0 million viewers) and Raising The Bar (7.7 million) were the only other non-political or college football games among the top 10 most-watched programs for the week. Raising The Bar, the latest drama from Steven Bochco, was the highest-rated debut in cable history.
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