¿Donde esta Univision? Beating its English-language rivals and dominating Monday night with the two-hour finale of megahit telenovela “La Fea Mas Bella.”
The program — translated as “The Prettiest Ugly Girl” — averaged more than 9 million viewers on Monday and was followed up by a special edition of “El Show de Cristina” devoted to the “La Fea Mas Bella” phenomenon.
For the night, Univision beat the five major broadcast webs among all adults 18-49 (not just among Hispanic viewers) with a 3.0 rating/9 share. Net also won in adults 18-34.
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A continuation of the “Betty La Fea” series (which was translated into the ABC series “Ugly Betty), “La Fea Mas Bella” ranks among Univision’s most popular novelas of all time. The finale actually attracted more adults 18-34 than “Ugly Betty” did in key markets including Los Angeles, Chicago and San Francisco, according to Univision.
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Of course, as the English-language broadcast webs enter the summer doldrums, it’s not as hard to show them up. Fox managed to win the week ended Sunday in adults 18-49 with a 2.2 rating/7 share despite slipping 12% vs. the same week last year.
Fox’s win brings its streak up to 20 weeks — the longest run atop the adults 18-49 competish since NBC’s streak in 1998.
CBS, meanwhile, was tops with viewers — averaging 7.1 million — even though the Eye was down 6% vs. last year.
But NBC probably had the best week of anyone, as it managed the only total-viewers uptick (up 1% to 6.3 million) and was the only network that avoided double-digit drops in key demos.
Peacock was helped by “America’s Got Talent,” the top-rated show among adults 18-49 and viewers, as well as Matt Lauer’s special “Dateline” interview with Princes William and Harry (the second most watched program of the week).
On the flip side, ABC had a rough week, coming in fifth place — below Univision — in adults 18-49, where it was down a hefty 30% from the previous year.
Rounding out the top five among adults 18-49 were Fox reality entries: two editions of “So You Think You Can Dance” as well as “Hell’s Kitchen.”
On the cable front, Disney Channel is coming off one of the best primetime weeks in its history, averaging 3.1 million total viewers for the seven days — a gaudy 15% ahead of second-place USA.
Friday’s cable premiere of “Spy Kids 3D: Game Over” harvested 4.8 million viewers for Disney, becoming the most-watched basic-cable movie in the second quarter. The Sunday primetime episode of “Hannah Montana” delivered 7.4 million viewers to become the highest-rated half-hour in the history of “Montana,” already one of the net’s bellwether series.
USA wound up second for the week in total primetime viewers overall on the strength of two hours of World Wrestling Entertainment’s “Raw” and three runs of theatrical “The Pacifier” with Vin Diesel.
TNT came in a strong third in primetime on the strength of record auds for the season premiere of “The Closer” on June 18, while movies drove TBS into fourth place, aided by two primetime runs of “Tyler Perry’s House of Payne.” Fox News finished fifth, and Lifetime, basking in the success of rookie “Army Wives,” charged into sixth.