TV Ratings : NBC Wins Week With an All-Around Performance

NBC scored another sweeping victory in the prime-time ratings last week, getting winning performances not only from its reliable Thursday night shows but also from “Mad About You,” “The John Larroquette Show,” “Law & Order,” two movies and even a “Bloopers” special.

Part 2 of NBC’s movie “The Beast” ranked third for the week and its Sunday night telecast of the 1993 film “The Fugitive,” starring Harrison Ford, was fifth, attracting about 10 million more viewers than Part 1 of CBS’ TV movie “A Season in Purgatory,” with Brian Dennehy, which was runner-up in that time slot.

Defending prime-time champion ABC finished in third place for the week, with its two highest-rated programs coming from the news division: the Barbara Walters tribute and a “Turning Point” about sextuplets. ABC has trailed both NBC and CBS in three of the last four weeks.

Despite the special programming undertaken for the May ratings sweeps, ABC, CBS and NBC combined to attract only 53% of the prime-time audience last week, the same figure they have been averaging for the season. Fox accounted for another 11%, down from 12% for the season.

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Southland Ratings

Here are A. C. Nielsen’s Top 10 prime-time programs in the Los Angeles area during the same week. Each rating point equals 50,064 households.

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Program Station Rating 1. Seinfeld KNBC 22.6 2. ER KNBC 22.4 3. Friends KNBC 21.2 4. “The Beast” Part 2 KNBC 19.8 5. The Single Guy KNBC 17.8 6. Frasier KNBC 16.5 7. The X-Files KTTV 15.3 8. “The Fugitive” KNBC 15.3 9. 60 Minutes KCBS 15.3 10. NYPD Blue KABC 15.1

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Weekly Averages

NBC 12.7

CBS 9.5

ABC 8.9

FOX 6.6

UPN 2.7

WB 2.1

Season to Date

NBC 11.7

ABC 10.6

CBS 9.6

FOX 7.3

UPN 3.1

WB 2.5

Source: A.C. Nielsen