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"Millionaire" Tops Itself
Who Wants to Be a Millionaire once again clobbered its own ratings records Wednesday night, as the third celebrity edition of Regis Philbin's quiz show nabbed a colossal 36.1 million viewers--becoming its most-watched episode ever.
With a 22.6 rating and 37 share, ABC reps say Millionaire delivered the network its biggest nonsports audience in 17 years (since March 30, 1983, when it aired an installment of The Thorn Birds miniseries). All three of Millionaire's celebrity-hot-seat-for-charity episodes have crushed the competition this week, giving the network a huge boost in the just-started May-sweeps race.
In last night's third installment, viewers watched Rosie build up to the $1 million question (what degree Anton Chekhov earned at the University of Moscow; the answer was medicine), before chickening out and settling for a $500,000 prize, which will go to the For All Kids Foundation. She and Drew Carey have been the only ones to reach $500,000.
The episode squashed CBS' typically strong yee-haw fest, the Academy of Country Music Awards (9.7 rating, 16 share), and NBC's once-powerful Dateline--which experienced its lowest ratings ever (4.6 rating, 8 share). CBS looked on the bright side, however, touting the country show's move to the top of the network heap once Millionaire ended at 9 p.m.
A ratings point represents about a million households. The share is the percentage of turned-on televisions tuned to a particular show.
With Millionaire's Monday and Tuesday shows already hitting all-time highs, another whupping was expected. Monday night's episode--which featured David Duchovny, Dana Carvey and Kathie Lee Gifford--hit the show's previous all-time high, drawing some 35.8 million viewers, topping the combined ratings for CBS, NBC and Fox by more than 18 million viewers.
Meanwhile, ABC is counting on equally dramatic numbers tonight, when remaining celebs like 'N Sync dreamboat Lance Bass and CBS funnyguy Ray Romano face down Regis for the big money. (And, if you're a Los Angeles resident, take special care to watch a popular morning disc jockey choke as Romano's phone-a-friend lifeline).
ABC also has been credited with boosting earnings by 31 percent at its parent company, Disney. A huge surge in advertising (thanks to Millionaire) increased revenue at the Mouse House's media networks division to $2.4 billion. And not surprisingly, this week's success has already spawned talk of another celebrity edition next fall.
But next time, the celebrities' charities of choice might just be their own helpless networks.
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