Frank Micelotta / FOX, AP Photo/Charles DharapakPresident Obama was bigger than TV's biggest show. President Obama wasn't bigger than one of Fox's struggling shows.
Come again?
Obama's prime-time press conference averaged a combined 28.8 million viewers on 10 broadcast and cable networks last night versus 21.8 million for Fox's nail-biter of an American Idol results show, preliminary Nielsen estimates showed.
Obama took over the airwaves (well, most of them) at 8 p.m. ET/PT. Idol aired, per usual, at 9 p.m. So the two Nielsen powers didn't go head-to-head.
Not including the reporters who quizzed the president about swine flu and the economy, Obama's most direct challenger Wednesday night was Fox's Lie to Me. The two fought to a draw.
On the whole, Obama was 8 p.m.'s biggest draw. But no individual press-conference telecast was bigger than Lie to Me, which Fox opted to stick with over Obama.
Still, the Tim Roth series, of late on the fade, hardly embarrassed the president. Compared to last week, when the show faced stiffer competition than the same man's mug on every channel, Lie to Me was up only a tick among adults 18-49 and was actually down a tick in total viewers (7.9 million versus 8 million).
For Fox, however, Lie to Me was a big improvement over Obama—the network scored only about 4 million viewers for its coverage of the president's March 24 press conference.
America's Next Top Model, meanwhile, got as big a bump as Lie to Me, which is to say none, for being one of TV's main Obama alternatives. Airing in its usual 8 p.m. time slot—the CW doesn't ever do press conferences—the Tyra Banks show ran even with last week, scoring a network-best 4 million viewers.
Idol-topping or no, Obama's Wednesday performance was by far the least-watched yet of his three prime-time press conferences. His ratings on ABC, CBS and NBC were down a combined 30 percent from what those three networks scored for the March 24 presser. Overall, Obama's Nielsen approval rating fell by 11.6 million viewers.
On the upside for the president, at least he didn't have to spend his prime-time hour sweating out an uncomfortable Adam Lambert moment in the bottom two.
Elsewhere last night:
• The 100th episode of Lost (8.8 million) performed like Obama's commemoration of his 100th day in office: big, but not as big as before. The show was the night's top non-Idol show in adults 18-49 but was off nearly 1 million viewers from its season average.
• Criminal Minds (13.3 million) was the night's top non-Idol (and non-Obama) show in total viewers.