TV ratings: Derren Brown's lottery stunt draws 3m viewers

chris

Derren Brown's National Lottery stunt in which he appeared to guess the result of the midweek Lotto draw was watched by nearly 3 million viewers on Channel 4, more than were watching the lottery itself last night, Wednesday 9 September.

Channel 4's Derren Brown: the Event Live had 2.7 million viewers, a 17% share, between 10.35pm and 10.45pm, according to unofficial overnight figures.

Described as his most ambitious stunt to date, Brown has said he will explain how he pulled off the trick in a Channel 4 show tomorrow . The first of the five-part "events" series, last night's show was watched by another 109,000 on Channel 4+1.

Brown's show was simulcast across five Channel 4 services – also E4, More4, Film4 and 4Music – adding a further 400,000 viewers.

His show briefly made Channel 4 the most watched channel of the night. At the same time on BBC1, 2.4 million viewers watched the National Lottery Draws, while 2 million saw the Regional News and Weather on ITV1.

Earlier on, ITV1's coverage of England's 5-1 win over Croatia, which sealed qualification for the 2010 World Cup in South Africa, averaged 7.8 million viewers, a 36% share, between 7.30pm and 10.10pm.

Live coverage of the match, which kicked off at 8pm, averaged 8.8 million viewers, a 39% share, over two hours.

ITV1's live football easily beat two new series on BBC1, Nigel Slater's Simple Suppers and the docusoap Trawlermen. Slater's show began with 3.8 million at 7.30pm, 20% of the audience; while a new series of Trawlermen had 2.6 million, a 16% share, between 8pm and 9pm.

Docusoap repeat Motorway Cops averaged 3.5 million, a 16% share, between 9pm and 10pm on BBC1.

BBC2's docudrama The Last Days of Lehman Brothers, starring James Cromwell and James Bolam, had 1 million viewers, 5% of the audience, between 9pm and 10pm.

The BBC2 show lost out to the second series of Ramsay's Kitchen Nightmares USA on Channel 4, which averaged 1.4 million viewers, 7% of the audience, between 9pm and 10.35pm. Another 131,000 saw Ramsay on Channel 4+1.

Channel Five's Gwyneth Paltrow movie repeat, A Perfect Murder, had 900,000 viewers, a 5% share, between 9pm and 11.15pm. Five's most watched programme of the day was Neighbours at 5.30pm with 1.3 million viewers, 10% of the audience.

Also between 9pm and 10pm, Living TV's new dating show, Dating in the Dark, in which contestants are paired off in the dark, began with 197,000 viewers, a 0.9% share of the multichannel TV audience.

Brown returned to Channel 4 later in the evening with Derren Brown: the Gathering, a repeat showing of the mind bender's live show featuring a celebrity audience. This was watched by 1.6 million viewers, 16% of the audience, between 10.45pm and 11.55pm, with another 144,000 viewers on Channel 4+1.

ITV1's International Football highlights of England's 5-1 win averaged 1.2 million viewers between 10.45pm and 11.45pm.

Brown also had the better of BBC1's Michael Caine movie repeat The Quiet American, which averaged 900,000 viewers between 10.45pm and 12.20am.


Source:guardian