Medium Debuts Well
The Jan. 3 premiere of NBC's heavily promoted midseason supernatural drama Medium generated the network's best numbers for a drama premiere in more than four years, nearly catching CBS' hit CSI: Miami in key demographics, Variety reported. The series, starring Patricia Arquette, centers on an Arizona psychic who uses her abilities to help solve crimes.
Medium scored a 6.3 rating and 16 share (16.09 million viewers), the best results for a Monday debut on the network in nearly 11 years and the best for a drama on any night since Ed in October 2000, the trade paper reported.
Medium finished a close second in demographics to CSI: Miami (6.7/16 in 18-49, 18.49m) and, in an encouraging sign, grew by 10 percent in its second half-hour (6.6 vs. 6.0 in 18-49) and closed the gap with CSI: Miami to just two-tenths from 10:30 to 11 (6.6 vs. 6.8), the trade paper reported.
Reuters 1/4/05
NBC's Supernatural Medium Gets Promising Debut
TNBC's new supernatural drama Medium, starring Patricia Arquette as a real-life psychic who solves crimes with her power to see dead people, debuted to promising ratings on Monday night.
The highly promoted show conjured 16.1 million viewers and finished a close second to the CBS hit crime drama CSI: Miami in ratings for NBC's target audience, adults aged 18 to 49, Nielsen Media Research reported on Tuesday.
By comparison, CSI: Miami averaged 18.7 million viewers.
Still the debut of Medium gave NBC its highest 18-49 rating and its biggest audience overall for a Monday night premiere since the 1994 launch of Someone Like Me, the General Electric Co.-owned network said.
It also marked a two-fold increase over NBC's season average for Monday's 10 p.m. slot, a difficult time period for the network in recent years opposite CSI: Miami.
"For us against that show in that hour, that's a pretty strong performance," one NBC executive said. "If we see two-thirds of last night's performance over the long haul, it will be a big accomplishment for the network."
In its debut, Medium also ran up against ABC's highly rated telecast of college football's Sugar Bowl game. Later this month, it faces competition from ABC's Supernanny.
Medium is based on the true-life experiences of Allison Dubois, a suburban mother who uses her professed powers to read people's minds and communicate with the dead to serve law enforcement as a research medium and criminal profiler.
NBC is counting on the supernatural element of the show and storylines involving the lead character's personal life to distinguish it from CSI and other procedural crime dramas prevalent on prime time these days.