'Secrets and Lies' Hits Series High on Sunday

By Rick Kissell

One week from its season finale, Secrets & Lies shot up to a season high Sunday and helped ABC, which was the Big Four leader in young adults all four hours, win the night. Fox, meanwhile, got solid scores from its comedy block, which was all original for the first time in six weeks.

According to preliminary national estimates from Nielsen, ABC’s winning night opened with America’s Funniest Home Videos (1.5 rating/5 share in adults 18-49, 6.1 million viewers overall) and Once Upon a Time (1.7/5 in 18-49, 5.1 million viewers overall), with the former up a bit and the latter steady vs. last week.

The Alphabet standout on the night, though, was Secrets & Lies (1.7/5 in 18-49, 5.7 million viewers overall), which was up 0.2 to a series high and matched its Once lead-in; the 1.7 is also better than all but the fall’s first two weeks of Resurrection in the time period. Though ABC has made it clear in promos that the season-long Secrets mystery will be solved next week, it’s also clear that ABC will want to find a way to extend the series, which stars Ryan Phillippe and Juliette Lewis, into next season. Closing out the night for ABC, Revenge (1.0/3 in 18-49, 4.5 million viewers overall) held steady and was able to beat out its drama rivals on both CBS and NBC in 18-49.

Elsewhere, Fox aired its entire comedy lineup for the first time in six weeks and generated solid scores. Following an encore of The Simpsons (0.6/2 in 18-49, 1.7 million viewers overall) and an original “Bob’s Burgers” (0.9/3 in 18-49, 2.0 million viewers overall), a firstrun Simpsons (1.5/5 in 18-49, 3.3 million viewers overall) was up a tenth from last week. Brooklyn Nine-Nine had a nice return to originals (1.5/4 in 18-49, 2.8 million viewers overall), retaining 100% of its 18-49 lead-in, while Family Guy (1.5/4 in 18-49, 3.2 million viewers overall) was a bit low and The Last Man on Earth (1.4/4 in 18-49, 3.2 million viewers overall) was in line with recent results.

One week after it dominated Sunday with the ACM Awards, CBS was sluggish with its regular lineup of “60 Minutes” (1.¼ in 18-49, 10.2 million viewers overall), Madam Secretary (1.0/3 in 18-49, 10.4 million viewers overall), The Good Wife (1.0/3 in 18-49, 8.7 million viewers overall) and Battle Creek (0.7/2 in 18-49, 6.2 million viewers overall). CBS had the night’s four most-watched broadcasts overall, led by Madam.

And NBC improved its standing from 7 to 9 p.m. with a two-hour Dateline (1.0/4 in 18-49, 6.0 million viewers overall), but the stronger lead-in (including a 1.4 rating at 8:30 p.m.) didn’t help A.D. The Bible Continues (1.1/3 in 18-49, 5.7 million viewers overall), which was in line with last week. And American Odyssey (0.5/2 in 18-49, 2.9 million viewers overall) held at last week’s tiny 1.5.

Preliminary 18-49 averages for the night: ABC, 1.5/5; Fox, 1.2/4; CBS and NBC, 0.9/3; Univision, 0.8/2; Telemundo, 0.6/2.

In total viewers: CBS, 8.9 million; ABC, 5.4 million; NBC, 5.2 million; Fox, 2.7 million; Univision, 1.9 million; Telemundo, 1.5 million.

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