Drama, Reality Give ABC Ratings Win
By John Eggerton -- Broadcasting & Cable, 5/5/2008 4:00:00 AM MT
ABC won every half hour of prime Sunday on its way to a convincing win in the 18-49 demo.
ABC averaged a 4.2 rating/12 share. No other network broke a 3 rating.
ABC's top show was Desperate Housewives with a 6.2/16 at 9-10. Brothers and Sisters at 10 p.m. (3.9/10) also more than doubled the rating of CBS and NBC in the time period (1.8/5).
Also winning their time periods for ABC were Funniest Home Videos (2.4/9) and Extreme Makeover: Home Edition (4.1/12).
Fox was second with a 2.6/8, led by Family Guy with a 3.9/10 at 9-9:30.
In the cable-on-braodcast matchups of CBS and NBC, the former won out, taking third on the night, but with only a 1.8/5 average for a combination of 60 Minutes (1.6/6) and the off-Showtime two-hour finale of Dexter (1.7/5). NBC was fourth with a 1.2/4, including a blink-and-you-missed it 1 rating/2 share for Psych and .9/3 for Monk, both of which air on co-owned USA Network and work impressed into duty after the writers strike, as was Dexter.
The CW was fifth with a .5/1 for repeats of Next Top Model, Girlfriends and new outings for Everybody Hates Chris and Aliens in America.
