ABC - NIGHTLINE BEATS TONIGHT & LATE NIGHT AGAIN

NIGHTLINE BEATS TONIGHT & LATE NIGHT AGAIN

A year ago at this time, there was much speculation about the possibility that ABC would make a play to land Jay Leno after he left the Tonight show to compete against Conan O'Brien and David Letterman. According to the rumors, the network was preparing to spend big bucks for Leno in order to move into the lead in the late-night time period. Suddenly, however, the network has discovered that it didn't need to spend anything at all to become No. 1 at 11 30 p.m. For the past two weeks ABC's Nightline has topped both O'Brien and Letterman among total viewers. Nielsen figures show that last week, it averaged 3.89 million viewers, topping O'Brien, with 3.69 million, and Letterman, with 3.46 million. TVNewser.com observed that it was first time since 1996 that the Tonight Show hadn't placed first for two weeks in a row, excluding the 2007 writer's strike. Nightline 's audience, on the other hand, was up 25 percent from the comparable week a year ago.

03/07/2009