NBC is game for more ‘Deal’

VIEWERS resoundingly said yes to “Deal or No Deal,” with three episodes cracking last week’s Top 10, according to Nielsen Media Research figures released Wednesday, prompting NBC to order additional episodes.

The five episodes of the game show on which contestants choose a briefcase with a dollar figure inside, then have to decide whether to accept an offer from an unseen “banker,” averaged 12.7 million viewers.

By comparison, the first five episodes of ABC’s “Who Wants to Be a Millionaire,” which ushered in a short-lived era of prime-time game shows, averaged 11.5 million viewers in August 1999, when television viewership was lower.

All but the Dec. 20 episode recorded season-high viewership in the time period for NBC. The five episodes all won their time slots and exceeded NBC’s viewership in the time slots by an average of 51% and 54% among viewers ages 18 to 49, the group targeted by NBC, ABC and Fox Broadcasting.

NBC has ordered additional episodes, which are expected to begin airing in March, a network official said.

“Any time a show achieves good ratings, it’s a bit of a surprise, especially in today’s market, where hits have become particularly elusive,” said David Goldberg, president of Endemol USA, which produces “Deal or No Deal.”

“We certainly believed in the show and were confident based on ‘Deal or No Deal’s’ broad international success. However, that doesn’t automatically guarantee success, as we’ve seen many times before.”

In a week with little original scripted programming, CBS had the five most-watched shows from Dec. 19 through Sunday, to easily extend its streak of being the most-watched network for each week of the season to 14, the first network to do so since NBC in 1988.

CBS averaged 10 million viewers, followed by NBC with 7.7 million, ABC with 7.3 million, Fox with 6.8 million, UPN with 2.9 million and the WB with 2 million.

ABC was handicapped because Sunday, its most-viewed night, was Christmas, a day with traditionally low viewership, and its three serial drama hits -- “Desperate Housewives,” “Grey’s Anatomy” and “Lost,” which fare poorly in reruns -- were all in reruns last week.

However, ABC did benefit from the two-hour special “Barbara Walters Presents: Heaven. Where Is It? How Do We Get There?” It was Dec. 20’s most-watched program and seventh for the week with 13.8 million viewers.

With CBS showing a rerun of “CSI: Crime Scene Investigation,” a first-run episode of its spinoff “CSI: Miami” was the week’s most-watched show, attracting a season-high 20.3 million viewers. “CSI: Crime Scene Investigation” has been the most-watched show for 11 of the season’s 14 weeks, finishing second each of the other three weeks, twice with reruns.

CBS also had the most-watched first-year series, the comedy “Out of Practice,” which finished fourth overall with a series-high 15 million viewers. “Out of Practice” retained 85% of the audience of its lead-in, “Two and a Half Men,” which finished third with a season-high 17.7 million viewers.

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Prime-time TV Rankings

Here are the rankings for national prime-time network television last week (Dec. 19-25) as compiled by Nielsen Media Research. They are based on the average number of people who watched a program from start to finish. Nielsen estimates there are 277.93 million potential viewers in the U.S. ages 2 and older. Viewership is listed in millions.

*--* Program Net- work View- ers Program Net- work View- ers

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*--* 1 CSI: Miami CBS 20.33 2 CSI CBS 18.94 3 Two and a Half Men CBS 17.71 4 Out of Practice CBS 15.01 5 Without a Trace CBS 14.37

6 “Deal or No Deal” (Wed.) NBC 14.10 7 “Barbara Walters Presents” ABC 13.76 8 “Deal or No Deal” (Thu.) NBC 13.49 9 CSI: NY CBS 12.68 10 “Deal or No Deal” (Tue.) NBC 12.59

11 Criminal Minds CBS 12.42 12 Monday Night Football ABC 12.04 13 “Deal or No Deal” (Fri.) NBC 11.64 14 “Deal or No Deal” (Mon.) NBC 11.60 15 NFL Monday Showcase ABC 11.41

16 King of Queens CBS 11.31 17 NCIS CBS 10.67 18 How I Met Your Mother CBS 10.36 19 NFL Post-Game (Sun.) FOX 10.33 20 My Name Is Earl NBC 10.17

21 House FOX 9.17 22 Law & Order: SVU NBC 9.16 23 Law & Order NBC 8.97 24 Dateline: NBC (Fri.) NBC 8.74 25 Close to Home CBS 8.61

26 Numb3rs CBS 8.56 27 Law & Order: Criminal Intent (Fri.) NBC 8.39 28 Without a Trace CBS 8.29 29 Cold Case CBS 7.95 30 Rodney ABC 7.52

31 George Lopez ABC 7.51 Wife Swap ABC 7.51 33 “Finding John Christmas” CBS 7.46 34 Apprentice: Martha NBC 7.30 35 Grey’s Anatomy ABC 7.27

36 Crimetime (8 p.m.) CBS 7.23 37 According to Jim ABC 7.21 38 The Simpsons FOX 7.18 39 Lost (9 p.m.) ABC 7.10 40 Ghost Whisperer CBS 6.91

41 “Ice Age” FOX 6.87 42 Lost (10 p.m.) ABC 6.79 43 Crimetime Saturday (9 p.m.) CBS 6.67 44 ER NBC 6.58 45 48 Hours Mystery (Tue.) CBS 6.57

46 Desperate Housewives ABC 6.53 47 Joey NBC 6.49 48 Office NBC 6.46 Trading Spouses FOX 6.46 50 Nanny 911 FOX 6.42

51 20/20 ABC 6.40 52 Family Guy FOX 6.35 53 60 Minutes CBS 6.33 54 Freddie ABC 6.23 55 Crossing Jordan NBC 6.20

56 48 Hours Mystery (Sat.) CBS 6.05 57 Primetime ABC 5.94 58 America’s Funniest Home Videos (Sun.) ABC 5.92 Extreme Makeover: Home Edition (Sun.) ABC 5.92 60 Law & Order: Criminal Intent (Sun.) NBC 5.88

61 King of the Hill FOX 5.79 62 Will & Grace NBC 5.57 63 “Radio Music Awards” NBC 5.28 64 Extreme Makeover: Home Edition (Thu.) ABC 5.24 65 Bones FOX 5.05

66 America’s Funniest Home Videos (Sat.) ABC 4.99 67 That ‘70s Show FOX 4.93 68 Supernanny ABC 4.67 69 “I’ll Be Home for Christmas” ABC 4.55 70 “It’s a Wonderful Life” NBC 4.44

71 “Home for the Holidays” CBS 4.42 72 “Dr. Doolittle 2” FOX 4.32 73 Dateline: NBC (Sun.) NBC 4.23 74 Everybody Hates Chris (Thu.) UPN 4.17 75 Arrested Development (8 p.m.) FOX 4.14

76 Stacked FOX 4.10 77 Hope and Faith ABC 4.00 78 Everybody Hates Chris (Tue.) UPN 3.95 79 Hot Properties ABC 3.65 80 Everybody Hates Chris (Mon.) UPN 3.59

81 WWE Smackdown! UPN 3.55 82 Arrested Development (8:30 p.m.) FOX 3.43 83 Everybody Hates Chris (Wed.) UPN 3.30 84 7th Heaven WB 3.27 85 One on One UPN 3.26

86 Girlfriends (Mon.) UPN 3.13 87 All of Us UPN 2.89 88 Love Inc. UPN 2.81 89 Half and Half UPN 2.69 90 Smallville WB 2.67

91 The West Wing NBC 2.64 92 Gilmore Girls WB 2.60 93 The O.C. (9 p.m.) FOX 2.55 94 “Like Mike” WB 2.51 95 Eve UPN 2.46

96 The O.C. (8 p.m.) FOX 2.43 97 Girlfriends (Wed.) UPN 2.41 98 Cuts UPN 2.22 99 America’s Next Top Model 5 UPN 2.01 100 Veronica Mars UPN 1.91

101 Reba 7:30 p.m.) WB 1.84 102 Supernatural (Tue.) WB 1.77 103 One Tree Hill WB 1.76 104 Charmed WB 1.72 105 Reba (7 p.m.) WB 1.57

106 Related (Mon.) WB 1.56 107 Everwood WB 1.47 108 Related (Wed.) WB 1.31 109 Supernatural (Sun.) WB 1.30

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*--* Network averages Here is the number of viewers (in millions) that each network averaged per hour of prime time, for last week and for the season. Network Last week Season to date CBS 9.99 13.13

NBC 7.72 9.22

ABC 7.32 10.55

FOX 6.75 8.06

UPN 2.95 3.56

WB 2.01 3.40

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