A boost to NBC’s ‘Identity’

FOR the second consecutive year, NBC used the week before Christmas to successfully launch a new game show, with “Identity” winning its time slot on three of five nights, according to figures released Wednesday by Nielsen Media Research.

With the network using the identical strategy as it did a year earlier when it premiered “Deal or No Deal” against primarily reruns on the other networks, “Identity” won its time slots Dec. 18, Dec. 20 and last Friday, helping NBC to a second-place finish behind CBS between Dec. 18-24.

The two programs to top “Identity” were reruns of “NCIS” and “Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer,” both on CBS.

The Dec. 19 rerun of “NCIS” drew 10.92 million viewers from 8 to 9 p.m., while “Identity” drew 8.21 million, still a season high for NBC in the time period.

Thursday’s rerun of the perennial Christmas favorite “Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer,” first broadcast in 1964, drew 10.58 million viewers to “Identity’s” 9.53 million during that night’s 8 to 9 p.m. time period.

Reruns of the “CSI” franchise helped CBS remain undefeated for the season in the weekly ratings race, averaging 8.84 million on what is traditionally a little-watched week because of holiday vacations and reruns. NBC was second with 7.33 million, followed by ABC with 6.25 million, Fox with 5.61 million and the CW with 2.47 million.

CBS had 10 of the week’s 12 most-watched programs. Its five-minute National Football League postgame show was No. 1, with 17.32 million viewers.

ESPN’s “Monday Night Football” again was in its customary place atop cable programs, with the Dec. 18 game between the Cincinnati Bengals and Indianapolis Colts drawing 14.22 million viewers, which would have put it third among the programs on the five major broadcast networks.

The “NBC Nightly News With Brian Williams” finished first in the weekly ratings among the three network nightly newscasts for the 14th consecutive week and 125th time in the last 129 weeks with 9.48 million viewers.

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Here are the rankings for national prime-time network television last week (Dec. 18-24) 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 283.5 million potential viewers in the U.S. ages 2 and older. Viewership is listed in millions.

*--* 1 NFL Postgame (Sun.) CBS 17.23 2 Deal or No Deal (Mon.) NBC 15.37 3 CSI CBS 12.95 4 Identity (Mon.) NBC 12.26 5 CSI: Miami CBS 12.15

6 CSI: NY (Wed.) CBS 12.14 7 NCIS CBS 10.91 8 60 Minutes CBS 10.86 9 Two and a Half Men CBS 10.70 10 “Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer” CBS 10.58

11 Shark CBS 10.25 Criminal Minds CBS 10.25 13 House (Tue., 9 p.m.) FOX 10.11 14 Identity (Thu.) NBC 9.53 15 Grey’s Anatomy ABC 9.13

16 “I Want a Dog for Christmas, Charlie Brown” ABC 8.88 17 Identity (Wed.) NBC 8.76 18 Dateline: NBC (Wed.) NBC 8.64 19 The Unit CBS 8.61 20 Law & Order: SVU NBC 8.47

21 “The Sound of Music” ABC 8.34 22 King of Queens CBS 8.29 23 Law & Order: Criminal Intent NBC 8.23 24 Identity (Tue.) NBC 8.21 25 CSI: NY (Tue.) CBS 8.09

26 Old Christine CBS 8.05 27 Identity (Fri.) NBC 7.82 28 House (Mon.) FOX 7.61 29 Close to Home CBS 7.53 30 1 vs. 100 NBC 7.47

31 Law & Order (Fri.) NBC 7.19 32 America’s Funniest Home Videos (Fri.) ABC 7.14 33 Cold Case CBS 7.10 34 Law & Order (Sat.) NBC 6.91 35 House (Tue., 8 p.m.) FOX 6.87

36 Ugly Betty ABC 6.84 37 Numb3rs CBS 6.80 38 “Barbara Walters Special” ABC 6.76 39 Bones (Wed., 9 p.m.) FOX 6.74 40 Bones (Wed., 8 p.m.) FOX 6.65

41 Supernanny ABC 6.50 42 Wife Swap ABC 6.44 43 How I Met Your Mother (Mon.) CBS 6.28 My Name Is Earl NBC 6.28 45 Bones (Mon.) FOX 6.23

46 Medium NBC 6.21 47 Men in Trees ABC 6.15 48 How I Met Your Mother (Wed.) CBS 6.00 49 Crimetime Saturday (8 p.m.) CBS 5.97 50 America’s Most Wanted FOX 5.82

51 The Office NBC 5.78 52 Cops (8:30 p.m.) FOX 5.76 53 “A Very Married Christmas” CBS 5.75 54 La Fea Mas Bella (Mon.) UNI 5.74 55 The Class CBS 5.64

56 According to Jim ABC 5.62 57 La Fea Mas Bella (Wed.) UNI 5.58 58 La Fea Mas Bella (Tue.) UNI 5.50 59 Dateline: NBC (Sat.) NBC 5.31 60 “Home for the Holidays” CBS 5.29

61 La Fea Mas Bella (Thu.) UNI 5.27 62 America’s Funniest Home Videos (Sun.) ABC 5.18 63 Boston Legal ABC 5.08 64 Big Day (9 p.m.) ABC 5.05 65 Friday Night Smackdown CW 4.95

66 ‘Til Death FOX 4.94 67 “It’s a Wonderful Life” NBC 4.91 68 Scrubs NBC 4.90 69 48 Hours Mystery CBS 4.89 70 George Lopez (8:30 p.m.) ABC 4.88

71 George Lopez (9:30 p.m.) ABC 4.82 72 Cops (8 p.m.) FOX 4.79 73 Primetime ABC 4.77 74 What About Brian ABC 4.58 75 Studio 60 NBC 4.52

76 La Fea Mas Bella (Fri.) UNI 4.42 77 Crimetime Saturday CBS 4.38 78 Justice FOX 4.37 79 George Lopez (8 p.m.) ABC 4.34 80 War at Home FOX 4.32

81 Big Day (9:30 p.m.) ABC 4.23 82 “Spiderman” FOX 4.21

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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 8.84 12.57

NBC 7.33 10.07

ABC 6.25 10.80

FOX 5.61 7.92

UNI 3.32 3.39

CW 2.47 3.40

TEL 0.68 0.83

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