Monday, March 18, 2024

“I Love Lucy” was Sunday Night’s Number 1 Scripted Show, Nearly Twice as Many Viewers as “Mad Men” Finale

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Sunday night: Two reruns of “I Love Lucy” from the 1950s, colorized (objectionable, but ok whatever) scored the highest total viewers of all scripted shows that night.

“Lucy” had 6.4 million total viewers. That’s almost twice the very high “Mad Men” score of 3.3 million viewers on Sunday. That’s shows with scripts. The Billboard Music Awards had 11 million, and “60 Minutes” had 9 million.

But of all the other shows on TV Sunday night– Dateline, The Simpsons, Battle Creek– Lucy prevailed.

“Lucy” scored twice as many total viewers as Andy Samberg in “Brooklyn Nine Nine.”

The two episodes of “Lucy” looked terrible, I thought. The beautiful original black and white looked garish and Crayola like. But “Lucy” is the Shakespeare of television comedy. A few others come close, but Lucy, Desi, Vivian Vance and William Frawley were in a league of their own. All their writers and directors were, too.

Roger Friedman
Roger Friedmanhttps://www.showbiz411.com
Roger Friedman began his Showbiz411 column in April 2009 after 10 years with Fox News, where he created the Fox411 column. His movie reviews are carried by Rotten Tomatoes, and he is a member of both the movie and TV branches of the Critics Choice Awards. His articles have appeared in dozens of publications over the years including New York Magazine, where he wrote the Intelligencer column in the mid 90s and covered the OJ Simpson trial, and Fox News (when it wasn't so crazy) where he covered Michael Jackson. He is also the writer and co-producer of "Only the Strong Survive," a selection of the Cannes, Sundance, and Telluride Film festivals, directed by DA Pennebaker and Chris Hegedus.
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