Big Audiences for BGT and The Voice

Talent contests The Voice and Britain’s Got Talent continue to draw big ratings on Saturday evening.

 
For the first time the two shows did not overlap each other meaning viewers could watch both without missing the start/end of either programme. ITV pushed back Britain’s Got Talent to 8.30pm for last night’s edition to avoid the costly clash with The Voice on BBC One and it was a strategy that worked.
According to overnight figures the latest edition of Britain’s Got Talent drew an average audience of 9.5 million viewers with an additional 500,000 watching an hour later on the time-shift channel. The peak audience for last’s edition of BGT was 10.6 million viewers. The Voice on BBC One meanwhile had an average audience of 9.8 million viewers with a peak audience of 11.6 million viewers for the first of the Battle Round.
Elsewhere last night medical drama Casualty pulled in 4.7 million viewers while The Million Pound Drop Live on Channel Four had 1.3 million viewers at 9.45pm. Channel Five pulled in 1.2 million viewers at 10.30pm for CSI: NY.
BBC Four’s new Scandinavian drama series The Bridge proved to be popular with viewers with 1 million viewers tuning in for the first episode at 9pm with 840,000 watching the second episode at 10pm. New musical drama Smash on Sky Atlantic could only muster 75k viewers last night at 10pm. The musical comedy, which airs on NBC in America, stars Jack Davenport, Debra Messing and Anjelica Huston.