The action was on the dance floor

During what is normally the year’s quietest TV week, the only things making noise were the shoes gliding across the stage on ABC’s “Dancing With the Stars.”

The penultimate episode of ABC’s ballroom dancing series was seen by 18.6 million viewers last week, according to figures released Wednesday by Nielsen Media Research. That was by far the week’s most popular program and one of only five programs to reach an audience of more than 10 million.

ABC has been repeating the previous week’s “Dancing With the Stars” episode right before the new one on Wednesday night -- and even that telecast made Nielsen’s top 10.

Results were mixed for some other summer first-run programming. Fox’s new drama “The Inside,” with 4.2 million viewers last week, has been met with a collective yawn. Viewership for the second episode of NBC’s “I Want to Be a Hilton” dropped 34% from the premiere, to about 4.45 million.

The premiere of the ABC limited series “Empire” was 28th overall but first among men ages 25 to 54 in its Tuesday 9-to-11 p.m. slot.

With its strong lineup of repeats, CBS again won the week, averaging 7.1 million viewers. ABC and NBC were in a dead heat with 5.9 million viewers each. Fox had 4.3 million, UPN 2.4 million, the WB 2.1 million and Pax TV 610,000.

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Here are the rankings for national prime-time network television last week (June 27-July 3) as compiled by Nielsen Media Research. They are based on the average number or people who watched a program from start to finish. Nielsen estimates there are 277.93 million potential viewers in the U.S. age 2 and older. Viewership is listed in millions.

*--* 1 Dancing With the Stars (9 p.m.) ABC 18.59 2 CSI CBS 13.32 3 Without a Trace CBS 11.38 4 CSI: Miami CBS 10.67 5 Two and a Half Men CBS 10.58

6 Everybody Loves Raymond CBS 9.70 7 Law & Order (10 p.m.) NBC 9.32 8 Dancing With the Stars (8 p.m.) ABC 9.27 9 “Daytona 400” NBC 8.31 10 CSI: NY CBS 7.74

11 Lost ABC 7.46 12 48 Hours Mystery (Tue.) CBS 7.41 13 Law & Order Wed. (9 p.m.) NBC 7.31 14 Crossing Jordan NBC 7.14 15 20/20 ABC 7.14

16 Hell’s Kitchen FOX 7.13 17 Medium NBC 7.13 18 House FOX 7.12 19 Primetime Live ABC 7.10 20 Still Standing (8 p.m.) CBS 7.02

21 Still Standing (8:30 p.m.) CBS 6.93 22 Cold Case CBS 6.80 23 48 Hours Mystery (Sat., 10 p.m.) CBS 6.76 24 “King Kong Trailer” NBC 6.73 25 Law & Order: Criminal Intent NBC 6.53

26 Extreme Makeover: Home Edition (9 p.m.) ABC 6.50 27 60 Minutes CBS 6.50 28 “Shanghai Noon” CBS 6.36 29 Empire ABC 6.35 30 Psychic Detectives NBC 6.25

31 60 Minutes Wednesday CBS 6.14 32 Las Vegas NBC 6.03 33 Fire Me Please! CBS 5.96 34 “60 Minutes: Child Prodigies” CBS 5.90 35 King of Queens (Wed.) CBS 5.78

36 Crimetime Saturday CBS 5.77 37 Nanny 911 FOX 5.68 38 Fear Factor NBC 5.63 39 Numb3rs CBS 5.61 40 America’s Most Wanted FOX 5.47

41 Law & Order: Trial by Jury NBC 5.38 42 Dateline: NBC (Sun.) NBC 5.36 43 Will & Grace NBC 5.35 44 “Air Force One” ABC 5.27 45 WWE Smackdown! UPN 5.25

46 “NBC Analysis” NBC 5.25 47 “Daytona 400 Rain Delay” NBC 5.23 48 King of Queens (Tue.) CBS 5.11 49 America’s Funniest Home Videos (Sun.) ABC 5.09 50 48 Hours Mystery (Sat., 8 p.m.) CBS 5.04

51 Yes, Dear CBS 4.98 52 Dateline: NBC (Fri.) NBC 4.97 53 Wonderful World of Disney ABC 4.95 54 Hit Me Baby One More Time NBC 4.90 55 JAG CBS 4.78

56 Cops (8:30 p.m.) FOX 4.77 57 The Cut CBS 4.70 58 Extreme Makeover: Home Edition (8 p.m.) ABC 4.58 59 Hope and Faith (9 p.m.) ABC 4.58 60 ER NBC 4.56

61 Desperate Housewives ABC 4.52 62 I Want to Be a Hilton NBC 4.45 63 Average Joe 4 NBC 4.33 64 The Inside FOX 4.17 65 8 Simple Rules ABC 4.09

66 Less Than Perfect ABC 4.07 67 Cops FOX 4.02 68 Hope and Faith (8:30 p.m.) ABC 4.01 69 America’s Funniest Home Videos (Sat.) ABC 4.00 70 Beauty and the Geek (Wed.) WB 3.92

71 “Cats and Dogs” FOX 3.84 72 George Lopez ABC 3.81 73 That ‘70s Show (Thu., 8:30 p.m.) FOX 3.66 74 That ‘70s Show (Wed.) FOX 3.58 75 The Scholar ABC 3.50

76 That ‘70s Show (Thu., 8 p.m.) FOX 3.44 77 Trading Spouses FOX 3.43 78 “Lost World: Jurassic Park 2” FOX 3.21 79 “Live 8: Worldwide Concert” ABC 2.90 80 Stacked FOX 2.85

81 Blue Collar TV (8 p.m.) WB 2.82 82 Blue Collar TV (8:30 p.m.) WB 2.76 83 Girlfriends (Mon.) UPN 2.58 84 Half and Half (Mon.) UPN 2.43 85 Reba WB 2.40

86 Smallville WB 2.38 87 Gilmore Girls WB 2.32 88 The O.C. FOX 2.28 89 All of Us (Mon.) UPN 2.22 90 Beauty and the Geek (Thu.) WB 2.20

91 7th Heaven WB 2.11 92 One on One UPN 2.08 93 Summerland WB 2.08 94 Eve (8:30 p.m.) UPN 1.94 95 Living With Fran WB 1.86

96 Eve (8 p.m.) UPN 1.65 97 Veronica Mars UPN 1.65 98 Girlfriends (Tue.) UPN 1.64 99 Half and Half (Tue.) UPN 1.62 100 All of Us (Tue.) UPN 1.58

101 What I Like About You (8:30 p.m.) WB 1.55 102 What I Like About You (8 p.m.) WB 1.54 103 Beauty and the Geek (Sun., 8 p.m.) WB 1.51 104 Beauty and the Geek (Sun., 9 p.m.) WB 1.49 105 Beauty and the Geek (Sun., 7 p.m.) WB 1.42

106 Bad Girl’s Guide UPN 1.39 107 One Tree Hill WB 1.36 108 “Harvard Man” UPN 1.03

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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 7.08 12.21

ABC 5.93 9.57

NBC 5.86 9.30

FOX 4.28 9.38

UPN 2.38 3.26

WB 2.10 3.19

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Los Angeles Times