[music]

Faye Dunaway: Last year we were the number four network. Next year we're number one.

[cheer]

Brian Lehrer: Brian Lehrer on WNYC. Who remembers or recognizes that? That was Faye Dunaway in the 1976 movie, Network, about a TV network that skyrockets in popularity after exploiting a news anchor who had a suicidal breakdown on the air by giving him a show in prime time, of course. That cynical storyline is obviously fiction but threads remain true today, fear and violence sell on television, from the most-watched shows on Netflix and HBO to the Nightly News and Beyond.

Today, we are wrapping up our Life-by-the-Numbers quiz series with what we can learn about our culture these days from TV ratings. Who wants to play? If you answer your question right, you get to choose between a Brian Lehrer Show t-shirt and a Brian Lehrer Show mug. Who wants to play? Call in at 212-433-WNYC, 433-9692. Today's guest is NPR TV critic Eric Deggans. Eric, welcome back to the show. Thanks so much for coming on.

Eric Deggans: Thanks, I feel like there should be a theme song or something. Shouldn't we have something like The Price Is Right theme or something playing in the background?

Brian Lehrer: You're ahead of us. We're going to have to hire you as a design consultant. Listeners, with Eric Deggans, the great Eric Deggans, who you've heard for years on NPR, as a TV critic, call in and take a shot.

These questions are about TV ratings, but you know why we do these quizzes, folks. This isn't just to see a popularity contest and who wins that when we talk about TV ratings. This is a reflection of the culture that we're going to get at here, but in the meantime, you could win a prize. Who wants to play? 212-433-9692. Just Eric, while people are getting in line, you're a critic, so you deal with the content of the shows, but do you ever think or write about ratings?

Eric Deggans: I just did a story for NPR about the ratings of the Winter Olympics, which were the worst in the history of NBC's coverage of the sport. What's interesting about ratings is that once upon a time, they were the coin of the realm in media. They were assembled by an independent company, Nielsen, and everyone in the business had access to them. It was a way to somewhat objectively judge whether or not a TV show was popular, but now, thanks to streaming, streaming has upended everything because streaming companies don't generally release detailed figures on who's watching their shows.

We're in this media moment now where some of the most popular shows, we think, we can only go by the figures that are released by the company, and nobody can independently verify them. TV ratings used to be a way of drawing us all together to say, "What do we all care about?" Now it's harder to know that.

Brian Lehrer: Though we certainly have metrics about the streaming platforms as well, and we'll be getting into some of those. Lisa in Forest Hills, you're on WNYC. Ready for quiz question?

Lisa: Yes, thank you. I'm excited.

Brian Lehrer: All right, Lisa. Can you name any one of the top five most-watched TV finales of all time? There are five that stand out for getting the most viewers. TV finales from TV series. Can you name any one of the top five most-watched TV finales of all time?

Lisa: Of all time. M*A*S*H?

Brian Lehrer: M*A*S*H is right.

Eric Deggans: You got it.

Brian Lehrer: In fact, that's the number one.

Lisa: Wow. Oh, my gosh.

Brian Lehrer: That's the number one.

Eric Deggans: Exactly.

Brian Lehrer: Lisa, do you want a t-shirt or a mug?

Lisa: I think I'd like a mug, please.

Brian Lehrer: Then hang on and we're going to take your address.

Eric Deggans: Well done Lisa. How did you know that, Lisa? How did you know that?

Brian Lehrer: Oh, I think she's already on hold giving her address to the producer, sorry.

Eric Deggans: That's amazing. I've got an anecdote about that actually.

Brian Lehrer: Yes, tell me.

Eric Deggans: As you're probably going to say, almost 106 million people watched that finale. According to [unintelligible 00:04:45] the water table in New York City went down during the commercial breaks because so many people went to the bathroom at the same time. That's how many people were watching this show.

Brian Lehrer: 106 million people out of a country of about 300 million people. That's just an incredible percentage of the country doing the same thing at the same time, probably never to be replicated again. NBC's Cheers was number two, 84 million viewers in 1993. Seinfeld's finale in 1998, 76 million viewers. 2004, The Friends finale at 66 million viewers, and number five was Magnum P.I.'s finale, 50 million viewers for CBS in 1988. I guess the question is, why are they so old, every single one?

Eric Deggans: Well, of course, because there are so many more programming options now, TV's audiences have fragmented. More than that, TV's audiences want programming that speaks specifically to what they're interested in. It is much harder to come up with a fictional show that appeals to such a wide range of people. Now, the viewership for the Super Bowls still get up to that level.

Brian Lehrer: Hold that thought because that's related to question number two.

Eric Deggans: I'm sorry. It's related to question two. I won't give it away. You're right in noting that scripted TV shows, it's really hard to get up to those numbers because there's just so many options for people now.

Brian Lehrer: All right, we're going to go to Tim in Brooklyn, who's going to get that second question. Hi, Tim. Ready to play?

Tim: Yes.

Brian Lehrer: The question is-- Actually, Eric, you want to give it to him? Do you have it?

Eric Deggans: Sure. The Super Bowl is usually the most-watched single show of the year, but within 10, how many of the top 100 most-watched programs of 2021 were NFL football? You're thinking about the top 100 most-watched programs of 2021, how many of them were NFL football games?

Brian Lehrer: Within 10.

Eric Deggans: Within 10. Yes, we'll spot you within 10.

Tim: Okay, let's say 7.

Brian Lehrer: 7 is wrong. Tim, thank you for giving it a shot. This blew my mind, Eric, when I read it the other day. 39?

Eric Deggans: Yes. As I was going to say, [chuckles] unfortunately, I almost blew that question, but yes, live sports is the one thing that still draws in a wide range of viewers. In fact, if you look at the most-watched episodes of television in TV history, you will see M*A*S*H and you will see Super Bowls. Sports and football in particular, still remain popular with TV viewers.

Brian Lehrer: Let's go next to Paulina in Manhattan. Paulina, you're on WNYC. Ready to play?

Paulina: Yes.

Brian Lehrer: Eric, to continue on the theme we were just on, why don't we skip ahead to question five, because I think that one will be really interesting here.

Eric Deggans: Sure. In 2020, the Academy Awards broadcast was the number two watched show overall. Now, the very next year, in 2021, did it make it to A, number one? B, did it drop out of the top 100 shows? Or C, neither of the above?

Paulina: Okay, it's either B or C. I'm going to go with C.

Brian Lehrer: C, neither of the above unfortunately is wrong, Paulina. Thank you for trying. Eric, this one blew my mind too. The Academy Awards broadcast, which I think frequently has been the number two rated show of the year next to the Super Bowl, dropped out of the top 100 last year.

Eric Deggans: Yes. I think it was delayed, I'm pretty sure it was delayed, and it was presented during the pandemic. One of the things that we're still trying to figure out is whether or not doing these award shows during a pandemic have affected their ratings. All the award shows are down by significant numbers in ratings. It seems like during the pandemic, TV viewers just decided they don't care about award shows anymore. All of them have been doing badly, but we've also had other problems.

The Oscars had a controversy, where Kevin Hart was chosen to host and then didn't. People have been looking critically at the Oscars broadcast for a while. The Golden Globes had a lot of controversy, and NBC decided not to even air the Golden Globes this year. There's a lot of reasons even outside of the audience's interests that have affected viewership of TV award shows. That's why everybody is looking at the Oscars that are coming up soon this year to see if the show will rebound.

Brian Lehrer: Later this month, March 27th, I believe is the night. Andrew in Astoria, you ready for the next question?

Andrew: Yes. Good morning, Brian.

Brian Lehrer: Good morning. I'm going to skip ahead here, Eric, to question 11 on our sheet, because I think these news questions are really interesting to our listeners and I want to make sure to get an in. On news on television, Andrew, what was the most watched cable news channel last year out of CNN, MSNBC, and Fox?

Andrew: Can you repeat the options, the three options one more time, please?

Brian Lehrer: MSNBC, CNN, and Fox. The three main cable news channels, out of those three, which one had the most viewers last year?

Andrew: Fox News.

Brian Lehrer: It is Fox News, so, Andrew, hang on, we're going to take your address and send you a mug or a t-shirt as you like it. Then we're going to go-- before we talk about that, we're going to do the next question, and let's do it with Ari and Passaic, who's next in line. Hi, Ari, you ready for your question?

Ari: I'm ready for my question, Brian. Thank you.

Brian Lehrer: Eric, you want to hit him with question 12?

Eric Deggans: Sure. Which gets more viewers on a typical night? Tucker Carlson, Fox's most watched prime time host or the CBS Evening News? Which one gets more viewers on a typical night, Fox news host, Tucker Carlson, or the CBS Evening News?

Ari: I'd say Tucker Carlson.

Brian Lehrer: Unfortunately or fortunately, depending on your point of view, that's wrong. Eric, let's talk about that. These stats, well, Tucker Carlson, Fox's most watched prime time host has about 3 million viewers a night. The CBS Evening News has about 5 million viewers a night and the CBS newscast is the least watched of the three old nightly newscasts. NBC Nightly News gets about 7 million a night. ABC World News Tonight gets the most with about 8 million.

This is all from an article that I forgot my source, but it's a mainstream article that I read this week. For all the attention paid to the influence of Fox News, its most watched host is beat by the old line network newscasts 20 million to 3 million every night. My question for you, Eric, is Fox kills it on cable news, but is dwarfed for news viewers by the old networks. How would you describe the impact that they actually have or that any of the cable news channels have?

Eric Deggans: Well, this is a longstanding issue and I get the ratings reports often, so I can vouch that these figures are accurate. The network evening newscast, the audience they draw is much older, number one. They're not as valued by advertisers. Tucker Carlson's audience is probably old too, but I'm just saying--

Brian Lehrer: Fox's audience generally is old, isn't it?

Eric Deggans: Generally it's older, but one reason why the TV industry isn't as focused on the evening news is because in the broadcast world especially, that audience is older and they're not as focused on catering to them. It has always been true that the network evening newscasts, people talk about them being dead. They're not dead. A lot of people watch them and I just think it makes for a glitzier story sometimes for media writers to focus on cable TV news because there's so much more friction, energy, and conflict happening there, but more people are watching the evening newscast, they are older and those evening newscasts don't seem to have as much of an impact on the political discussions that we're having or the way we talk about issues and that's also important. We should probably talk about the previous answer too.

Brian Lehrer: Go ahead.

Eric Deggans: Asking what was the most watched cable news channel? That is Fox. Fox dominated prime time, had an average total audience of more than 2.6 million viewers. That's another reason why people tend to talk a lot about Fox, is because it's the most watched cable news channel, and often it is the most watched cable channel period. Especially when Trump was president and the presidency seemed much more volatile and unpredictable, people were tuning into the news quite a bit more and so news became much more of a viewership driver in cable TV overall. Fox had often leads the pack there.

Brian Lehrer: Let's see if we can give away at least one more mug or t-shirt. Kara in Brooklyn, you're on WNYC. Ready to play?

Kara: Hi, Brian, I'm ready to play.

Brian Lehrer: All right. I'm going to go to question nine, Eric, to get the streaming services issue in here. Netflix, Kara, had its most watched series ever in 2021. What was it?

Kara: Netflix 2021?

Eric Deggans: Can I give a hint?

Brian Lehrer: Sure.

Kara: Sure.

Eric Deggans: Red light, green light.

Kara: I'm going to go with Squid Game.

Brian Lehrer: Which is right.

Eric Deggans: I wanted to make sure that we got that last mug out the door.

Brian Lehrer: That was good of you, Eric. That was very generous.

Kara: Thanks for the hint. I appreciate it.

Brian Lehrer: A mug or a t-shirt, Kara?

Kara: A mug, please.

Brian Lehrer: Okay, hang on. We'll take your address. Let's talk about that. Netflix reports more than, I think the number was 1.6 billion, it was something well over a billion Squid Game hours watched, which is two and a half times out of Netflix's next biggest show Shonda Rhimes's Bridgerton season one, which generated about 625 million hours viewed, they say, over its first 28 days of the release. I don't even know how to understand those numbers, but here's my question to you before we run out of time.

Eric Deggans: Sure.

Brian Lehrer: Is the rise of streaming services affecting TV content for better or worse, or just not so different? Is the culture being affected by the fact that we're getting TV more by streaming rather than the old networks?

Eric Deggans: Oh, definitely. Streaming is definitely affecting TV content. It's hard to know. Obviously, streaming shows are reaching a lot of people. It's just hard to know what exactly those figures are. The way streaming is changing TV is that it's forcing media companies to spend more money on shows because they have to compete and it's offering viewers many more options, so they have a much wider palette of content to choose from. It's providing a lot of opportunities for the types of people who used to be locked out of the TV industry.

We're seeing more shows featuring non-white people, featuring women, featuring gay people, and transgender people. In particular, actresses of a certain age who used to be written off by Hollywood, they're forming their own production companies, they're controlling the limited series that they appear in that are often on streaming. Streaming has enriched TV in a lot of ways, but these figures that Netflix gives out, I have no way to judge them.

I don't know how that translates into how many people actually sat down and watched Squid Game, and how many people watch Squid Game in America too, because that's a South Korean show and obviously it would've been popular in that country and it would've been popular in that part of the world too. Is it fair to compare a show that has a huge constituency overseas to a show that just might only be popular here in America? It is really hard to know how many people are watching these shows and how much of an impact they're having on the culture in that way, because these figures of how many hours people watched, that doesn't really tell you much about who actually watched it.

Brian Lehrer: Eric, thanks a lot for doing this with us and helping facilitate this little quiz and telling us what it really means, these viewing patterns in America today. Eric Deggans, NPR TV critic, thank you so much.

Eric Deggans: Always a pleasure.

Brian Lehrer: Brian Lehrer on WNYC, much more to come.

 

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