BSkyB has caused shock waves in the industry with the news that its new Harry Enfield series attracted a 4.7% share of the total TV audience on Monday night.
Unofficial ratings suggest the show attracted 891,000 viewers, giving Sky its biggest share of the market since it broadcast a double episode of Friends in June 1998. The figures prove for the first time that viewers will follow a favourite programme, even when it switches to another channel. Sky usually only attracts such high viewing figures for its high-profile US imports, Friends, ER and the Simpsons.
Sky's new Al Murray (aka the Pub Landlord) sitcom, broadcast immediately after Harry Enfield, also performed well. It attracted 439,000 viewers, giving it a 2.7% share of the total TV market.
Last night's figures show that the return of BBC 1's Castaway has failed to capture the public's imagination. The programme attracted just 6.1m viewers, a 28% share of the market, with viewers preferring to tune into ITV's The Bill - also broadcast at 8pm. The Bill attracted 8.5m viewers, giving it a 37% share of the TV market.
The BBC fared better with EastEnders, with 11.3m viewers tuning in to the 7.30pm broadcast, giving BBC1 a 52% share of the market.
Big Brother continues to dominate people's late-night viewing, attracting 5m viewers eager to capture the last days of Craig, Anna and Darren in the Big Brother house. The show, broadcast at 10pm, got a 24% share.
Channel 5's new Big Brother-style game show, Jailbreak, attracted 1m viewers giving it a 5% share. The programme, in which contestants are challenged to escape from a set that has been designed to look like a prison, will be broadcast every evening for the next three weeks.
But the real stars of yesterday's schedules were the news broadcasts. The Nine O'Clock News attracted 8.4m viewers, giving it a 35% share of the total and proving that people are far more likely to tune into news broadcasts at a time of national upheaval. The petrol crisis also spurred 2.6m viewers to tune into BBC2's Newsnight, giving it an 18% share. Proof, if any were needed, that we really do love a crisis.
