“Judge Judy” warms up for final season by trouncing all rivals
Review based on a national syndicated rating report for the week ending September 6, 2020.
“Drew Barrymore” Has Strong Debut
It didn’t matter that Judge Judy (4-week high 5.6 live plus same day national Nielsen rating, up 2% from the week before) was completely in reruns. As the highest-rated first-run syndicated show since 2009 prepared to begin its final season, “Judy” blew the competition away in the session ending September 6 and finished as the week’s overall number one program.
The popular jurist has been especially merciless on fellow gavelers, leading all syndicated court shows in the ratings for an amazing 1,250 weeks in a row, or, every week for the past 24 years.
The big news in the metered markets took place on September 14 when The Drew Barrymore Show (preliminary 1.0/3 weighted average in 44 metered Nielsen markets) celebrated its eagerly awaited premiere. Right out of the box it was the number one show in its time slot in top market New York (where it airs at 9am on WCBS-TV).
“Drew” grew by double digits from both its lead-ins and prior Monday time periods and took its station’s ratings up dramatically in numerous key cities, including increases of 233% in Los Angeles, 300% in Baltimore, and 400% in Jacksonville. One of the show’s best opening day performances was in Portland, Oregon, where it advanced 233% over year-ago and finished first in its 3pm time slot on KATU with a 2.0/7.
Meanwhile the September 14 sophomore season bow of Tamron Hall (preliminary 1.1/4 weighted metered market average, up 83% from the previous Monday) soared with an exclusive headline-making Andrew Gillum interview. Gillum most recently narrowly lost the race for governor of Florida.
Returning to the week-ending September 6 national ratings, none of the 14 talkers was able to improve. Dr. Phil (1.9 live plus same day national Nielsen rating, steady) easily led the group for the tenth time in the past 11 weeks.
In prime access time periods the only magazines hot enough to shrug off preemptions for coverage of NBA playoff basketball and gain ground were Entertainment Tonight (2.2, up 5%) and Access Hollywood (1.0, up 11%). Family Feud (5.4, down 2%) topped the game shows.
