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Karl Stefanovic juggles Today with 60 Minutes
On Monday the Today show had one of its rare national wins over Sunrise.
While finishing off Tuesday’s show, on location in Melbourne, Karl Stefanovic got word their 390,000 defeated Seven’s 332,000 but wasn’t about to begin the cheering. After all, it is Olympics season and a day’s triumph is not yet a weekly win.
“It’s been a long hard struggle, but we’re not getting over the moon about stuff like that,” he told TV Tonight.
“We’ve been steadily increasing our audience, it’s steady as she goes and we’ve been concentrating on getting …
Nine’s TV survivor
This week TV Tonight has spoken to key figures in Australian television: Tim Worner from Seven, Kim Dalton from the ABC and David Mott from TEN.
Today Nine Programmer Michael Healy sits down for his first interview here, sharing his thoughts on upcoming shows, programming trends, television journalism and hints of new titles.
Foremost in his mind is the recent success in acquiring the Top Gear brand, which will continue to have its local series delivered by Freehand Productions.
“We have a lot of respect for what Freehand did with Top Gear Australia,” he …
Ratings: Special Ops leaves Nine dangling
The Nine Network learned some tough lessons in Week 32. Two of its bright new hopes, Rescue: Special Ops and The Farmer Wants a Wife -both of which attracted critical acclaim- took middling figures for their season premieres. Nine appears to be finding out the hard way that a disillusioned audience may not even sample new content.
Seven streaked home with 28.7% over Nine’s 23.8% and TEN’s 21.5%. The ABC had 17.1% and SBS 8.9%.
Seven won 18-49 and 25-54 demos, and was just pipped in 16-39 by 0.1% by TEN. …
1.13m for Rescue premiere
Nine’s shiny new drama Rescue: Special Ops attracted an audience of 1.13m last night, third in its timeslot.
The action drama starring Les Hill, Libby Tanner and Peter Phelps was beaten by The Devil Wears Prada on 1.23m and Bones’ 1.19m.
For a big budget show with billboard promotions and good reviews, execs won’t be smiling just yet.
Seven’s Dancing with the Stars cleverly finished late, with its wedding march parody the final dance of the show. It took a cool 1.59m. Next Sunday Australian Idol will also run to an extended …
Returning: Domestic Blitz
As previously reported, Domestic Blitz is on the way back.
A new episode will screen at 6:30pm August 9th, in place of Random Acts of Kindness which has its last ep this weekend.
While the last episodes we saw struggled somewhat, last year it was a huge rater for Nine. It will no doubt benefit from the warm-up Random Acts as given the timeslot.
In this episode, 21 year old Loren Kendall has spent two years being treated for ovarian cancer. With her future uncertain, Loren’s one wish was to get married to her …
TEN loses week to Seven
There isn’t really any other way to put it. This week was TEN’s to lose.
After it set record television records with the MasterChef Australia finale its lead was superb, almost double Seven. While it was never going to maintain that distance it was left to face the reality of its core programming. Nine generally wins weeks with State of Origin’s 2m+ but TEN couldn’t take the week with a show on 3.7m.
Instead it was Seven that quietly strode through on 27.3% beating TEN’s 25.0% and Nine’s 23.4%. ABC had 16.5% and …
Ed Kavalee hearts TV
If you truly love your television, you should cast your eyes Ed Kavalee’s way this Thursday night. Sure, it’s a clip show with gags, unapologetically. Sure it’s a format ripped from the UK. But boy do we have some bad telly. And it’s Ed’s job to remind us.
TV Burp, as Kavalee explains, is not out to critique television. It’s an affectionate look at the week in TV. It’s an absurdist time capsule of the last seven days, slicing scenes out of context, giving them inappropriate set-ups, and letting the …
TEN wins second historic week
Network TEN has won the ratings week for only the second time since OzTAM people meters started in 2001.
The last time it won was April 2006 on the back of a week with The Biggest Loser finale leading into Big Brother and Thank God You’re Here.
This week it again won with reality television, the king hit MasterChef Australia. The show was number one for every one of its six nights this week powering to 2.36m viewers on Thursday. Unlike 2006, its share also gets a modest boost from having ONE HD.
As …
Domestic Blitz back before the cam
Despite some speculation earlier this year, Domestic Blitz is back in production at Nine.
The Australian reports that Richard Reid let slip during the Today show, commenting last week that he had to remain in Australia while Michael Jackson was being farewelled in LA.
The show finished production some months ago, surprising some staff who began making hurried calls looking for work. But Nine denied at the time the show was over, promising a return.
It seems they were right.
Last year it was a big hit for Nine. More recently, Random Acts of Kindness …
Random acts of oversights
An episode of Nine’s Random Acts of Kindness has created headaches for the owner of a Woodend animal rescue shelter, after a renovation made on the show failed to comply with Victoria’s animal practices code.
“As soon as I walked in and saw what the program had done, I knew we were in trouble in terms of failing to meet Department of Primary Industry guidelines governing the running of an animal shelter,” said proprietor Trish Burke.
Burke had been sent on a surprise trip while the work was carried out in secret in …
Inspiring Sunday night of telly
Sunday night turned on the inspiration, banishing the doom and gloom to a night of feelgood telly.
On top of MasterChef Australia and Random Acts of Kindness we had the season premiere of Dancing with the Stars, and a world-first with the routine by parlaympian Gerrard Gosens.
While the US series has included a deaf performer, Gosens is the first blind peformer to take to the Dancing with the Stars floor. It was stirring stuff as he put in an amazing waltz, capped off by a standing ovation (including from the band).
“I wish …
The ratings lotto
While the country held its breath on a $100m lotto, networks watched as their numbers stacked up in a routine order for Week 27. It followed two weeks of ratings upsets.
Seven won the week with 27.6% ahead of Nine’s 25.4% and TEN’s 24.8%. The ABC had 16.8% and SBS 5.4% as supplementaries.
Yet again TEN won three key demos 16-39, 18-49 and 25-54.
But while the country returned to a routine for first, second and third, some cities took a different view. Seven won Sydney, Melbourne and Perth, but Nine took Brisbane and …