2005 Tony Overnight Ratings Increase Over Last Year

Stopping a downward spiral, the CBS broadcast of the Tony Awards was up in overall ratings this year. The program added 160,000 viewers as compared to last year's broadcast, playing to approximately 6.62 million homes, according to the overnight ratings reports.

This year the Tony Awards did not face stiff competition. There was no NBA Final game to compete against and limited new programming on the other broadcast networks. Nevertheless, the Tonys did not triumph for the night, despite their ratings boost. The program was still third in households losing out to ABC and NBC, coming in with a 4.6 rating a single national ratings point represents 1% of viewers and an 8 share which represents the percentage of in use television sets tuned to a certain program for its three hour block. It was down 7% as compared to last year with adults age 18-49 and 11% with adults 25-54.

With a strong lead-in from 60 Minutes which received the highest rating of any show on the night, The 59th Annual Tony Awards started off well with a 6.1 rating and an 11 share for its 8pm to 8:30pm block. However that figure quickly fell and, for the 8:30pm to 9pm slot, the show went to a 5.4 rating and a 9 share. It perked a very tiny bit up for 9pm to 9:30pm with a 5.7 rating and a 9 share, but after 9:30pm viewership steadily declined for the rest of the evening.

Not surprisingly, the Tony broadcast did better in New York than in other markets. In this area, the program started out at 8pm with a 9 rating and a 16 share. Overall for the evening which includes the 60 Minutes hour, CBS received 8.9 rating and a 15 share in the New York area with the help of the Tony Awards.

So things are looking up in terms of Tony ratings this year and there may be better news ahead. The Tony Awards usually look good when the demographic breakdowns are available, as it skews to an educated, affluent audience. Those figures are not out as of yet.