And from Jim Guida comes this query…
You have mentioned how the ratings for the Tonys are always pretty low and the article to which you linked compared this year to last. I am curious as to how the Tonys' ratings compare with whatever it is CBS has on regularly in June during that time slot. I don't know how to access that information, but you, with your finger on the pulse of the entertainment world, probably do. If it's not too difficult, could you make the comparison?
Well, the previous week, a rerun of a TV-Movie (John Grisham's A Time to Kill) ranged from a 7 at the outset to a 9 in the final hour. The week before, a parlay of a Becker rerun and another TV-Movie ranged from 5 to 6. Earlier in May, the two-hour finale of Survivor got a 10.7 there. So the Tony rating of 5.4 is not wonderful but it's not a disaster. More to the point, it's probably not far from CBS's best expectation. I mean, you don't expect the Tony Awards to finish in the Top 20 or even to take its time slot…and CBS not only scheduled the show but gave it an extra hour.
Everyone assumes that the networks only care about being Number One. Obviously, they like that but the competition isn't as fierce as it once was. Once upon a time, if your show finished in third place in its time slot, you were probably dead even if (as was sometimes the case) advertisers were still eager to purchase time in your show. Nowadays, advertiser support and critical success can keep a show alive, especially if there's no viable replacement. This is probably the reason they aren't auditioning repacements for David Letterman even though he's been consistently losing to The Tonight Show by at least two points. Sponsors do seem to like to buy commercials on the Tony Awards, and it does a lot to improve the image of a network that broadcasts some pretty undignified programs. So it may be safe for now.
By the way: Another way they sometimes judge the strength of a show is not by how many tune in but on how well the show holds viewers who are tuned to that network. 60 Minutes, which was on before, had a 6.5 rating and the first half-hour of the Tonys had a 6.2, meaning that they held most of the audience of their lead-in. There was very little drop-off in the ratings over the length of the awards show — about what one would expect over a three-hour stretch.