Crime pays off

29 July, 2009 | By Jon Rogers

Factual shows on crime dominated the two main terrestrial channels last night at 9pm with the spoils going to ITV1’s Car Crime UK with 3.8m viewers (17.5% share).

The commercial network’s 60 minute show started off with 3.6m (16.7%) but then slowly grew its audience to 3.9m for the last half hour.

Last week the show attracted 3.2m (14.2%) in the same slot.

Over on BBC1 last night The Truth About Car Crime slipped slightly from the previous week when it gained 3m (13.6%) to 2.8m (12.7%) yesterday.

And crime, albeit of a more fictional nature, paid off with the ongoing US drama CSI: Miami pulling in 2.7m (12.4%) in the same 9pm slot.

There wasn’t much separating BBC2 and Channel 4 at 9pm. The second instalment of Desperate Romantics picked up 2m (9.2%), a drop of half a million compared to its launch episode last week. Averaging 2.1m (9.8%) over on Channel 4 was Big Brother which then picked up 324,000 an hour later on C4+1.

Original article here.

Desperate Romantics woo 2m

5 August, 2009 | By Kate McMahon

BBC2’s pre-Raphaelite costume drama Desperate Romantics wooed back its 2m audience last night, but was unable to temp any of the 500,000 viewers it lost last week.

The third instalment of Peter Bowker’s period drama attracted 2m and a share of 9.1% in the 9pm hour – exactly the same as last week’s viewing figures.

In fact, across all the terrestrial channels at 9pm, very little changed since last Tuesday.

Original article here.

Desperate Romantics drops to 1.7m
12 August, 2009 | By Kate McMahon

BBC2 period drama Desperate Romantics became increasingly desperate last night, losing another 300,000 viewers on its fourth outing.

Just 1.7m (8.1%) viewers tuned in to last night’s hour-long episode at 9pm on BBC2, down from 2.5m (11%) on the launch episode that aired on July 21.

Overall, the four episodes shown have proved more popular with older upmarket viewers. Just over 63% of people who have watched the show are aged 55+, and 67% of the audience is in the ABC1 demographic.

Despite the drama’s light hearted touch, just 10% of viewers across the series so far have been aged under 35.

Desperate Romantics won the 9pm hour’s wooden spoon, beaten by every other terrestrial channel.

ITV1’s 9pm factual series Car Crime UK scraped ahead of Five’s CSI: Miami by just 100,000 viewers. Car Crime UK fell from 3.7m (17%) for the hour last week to just 2.8m (12.9%) for the fourth part of the six part series last night.

CSI in return put on 100,000 viewers in its slot, drawing 2.7m (12.3%) across the hour.

BBC1’s new series Crimewatch on the Streets locked in first place at 9pm with 3.3m (15.5%) keeping watch, outdoing C4’s Big Brother which held relatively steady with 2m (9.3%) tuning in for the hour of highlights and an extra 542,000 (3.4%) catching up on C4+1.

Original article here.