Ratings roundup: “Harry” off to decent start

24345918319_ffa8698f08Cubs score; NFL slides a bit

(Editor’s Note: The YouTube video in this post was deleted.)

With the new season a week away, new programming is already popping up – and getting decent sampling.

The launch of Harry Connick Jr.’s daytime talk show Monday met ratings expectations, drawing a 1.4 household rating/4 share in 56 metered markets, according to Nielsen. Among females 25-54. Harry scored a 40 percent increase from year-ago time slots.

Harry scored a 60 percent ratings increase in New York City, where Fox-owned WNYW scored a 1.6/5 in households. Harry is shot at CBS Broadcast Center in the Big Apple.

Here in Chicago, Harry airs at 4 p.m. on Fox-owned WFLD and 9 p.m. on Fox-owned CW affiliate WPWR. Chicago ratings were not available.

Harry’s first guest was Sandra Bullock, who co-starred with him in 1998 theatrical Hope Floats. Then, he aired a filmed segment taking over an Atlanta-area nail salon for the day, with often hilarious results. To close the show, Connick performed a song from his latest album.

On Twitter, yours truly gave harry a grade of A: superb production, a great set in HD, and Connick’s charm, wit, and strong personality fit the program well.

Of course, I said the same thing about Dr. Oz when his show debuted in 2009, and…well, look how that turned out.

But the difference is – at least Harry Connick Jr. is very talented. Here’s to a long run. Just please avoid getting skewered on Last Week Tonight With John Oliver.

Three other shows made their debuts yesterday: T.D. Jakes’ new talker premiered in 26 metered markets with a 0.8/3 and The CW’s Robert Irvine Show fared even worse, with a 0.6. According to Twitter, viewers think Irvine should go back to the Food Network.

In other season premiere news, Dancing With The Stars started its new season strong with a 2.6 rating in adults 18-49, despite competition from an NFL game on ESPN and locally a Cubs-Cardinals game on CSN. Because of a Rams-49ers game airing on ABC-owned KABC in Los Angeles and KGO in San Francisco, Dancing aired earlier in those markets live at 5 p.m. PT (The 18-49 rating only reflects time period data. Dancing’s L.A. and S.F. numbers were not included in the total.)

And viewers who watched live saw a bizarre incident when hoodlums rushed the stage attempting to attack Olympic swimmer Ryan Lochte, who drew headlines for lying and cover-up a robbery incident in Rio while competing in the Olympic Games. Fortunately, no one was hurt as the two hoodlums were tackled by security and was hauled away by police. Four other Lochte protesters were also escorted out of the venue.

Meanwhile, CSN was on the competitive map at 9 p.m. with more than 390,000 households tuning in to see Hendricks’ bid for a no-hitter against the Cardinals fall short. But the Cubs won, and their magic number as of this writing is three. The next two Cubs-cardinals tilts (Tuesday, 7 p.m., Wednesday 12:30 p.m.) are on WLS-TV.

And finally, the new NFL season opened on a slightly down note in the ratings department, with Sunday games and Thursday night’s opener down from year-ago time periods. Ratings for the Bears-Texans opener Sunday were not available, but it doesn’t take a genius to figure out the Monsters Of The Midway’s ratings were also down, given their gameplay. But here’s an observation to take away from this weekend’s NFL action: the security team on Dancing With The Stars sacked more people Monday night than the Rams did.

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