‘Philadelphia’ Helps to Push CBS to the Top

Tom Hanks successfully stormed another beachhead Sunday, as CBS’ telecast of his Oscar-winning role in the movie “Philadelphia” helped the network achieve victory in the weekly ratings, based on results issued Tuesday by Nielsen Media Research.

Last week also found Jerry Seinfeld in the winner’s circle for more than his NBC series. The comic’s stand-up act topped all cable programs with more than 6 million viewers and was HBO’s highest-rated comedy special in five years--an impressive audience for the pay channel, which is available in less than a quarter of U.S. homes; meanwhile, a rerun of his NBC sitcom attracted a significantly larger crowd, ending “60 Minutes’ ” six-week streak as the most-watched series.

Original programming almost jogged the networks out of their summer ratings doldrums, as ABC’s quirky drama “Maximum Bob” and sketch comedy “Whose Line Is It Anyway?” both got off to promising starts, with the latter doing something “Ellen” couldn’t by virtually equaling the audience for lead-in “The Drew Carey Show.” Fox’s “Guinness World Records: Primetime” dropped 11% from its first airing but again won its time slot and ranked as the week’s No. 1 show among teenagers

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Cable Top 10

Here are Nielsen’s top 10 cable programs in prime time last week, also ranked by total viewers (in millions).

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Program Network Viewers 1. Seinfeld Stand-Up HBO 6.35 2. Wrestling (Mon., 10 p.m.) USA 5.42 3. “Contact” feature movie HBO 5.21 4. Wrestling (Mon. 8 p.m.) TNT 4.95 5. Wrestling (Mon. 10:05 p.m.) TNT 4.90 6. Wrestling (Sun., 7 p.m.) USA 4.78 7. Wrestling (Mon., 9 p.m.) TNT 4.71 8. Wrestling (Mon., 9 p.m.) USA 4.64 9. Pacific Blues USA 4.61 10. Sex and the City HBO 4.44

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Network Averages

Here is the number of viewers that each network averaged per hour of prime time, for last week and for the season.

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Last week Season to date NBC 8.98 million 13.76 CBS 9.23 12.85 ABC 7.93 11.15 FOX 6.78 9.61 WB 3.37 4.18 UPN 2.28 3.63

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Southland Viewing

Here are Nielsen’s Top 10 prime-time programs in the Los Angeles area during the same week. The rankings are based on the number of households watching.

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Program Station Households 1. Seinfeld KNBC 771,421 2. “Guinness World Records” KTTV 696,283 3. Just Shoot Me KNBC 676,246 4. “Philadelphia” KCBS 661,218 5. ER KNBC 646,191 6. Suddenly Susan KNBC 641,181 7. Friends KNBC 636,172 8. Dateline: NBC (Tue.) KNBC 596,098 9. Dateline: NBC (Mon.) KNBC 586,080 10. Ally McBeal KTTV 551,015

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