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The Queen and Titanic sink in TV ratings
war(Electronic Telegraph)
By Tom Leonard, Media Correspondent
FEWER people care about the Queen's traditional Christmas television
message than ever before, according to viewing figures released yesterday.
The 10-minute broadcast on BBC1 and ITV at 3pm on Christmas Day, drew
only 9.8 million viewers. It marked the first time since television sets were
available to every household that the audience for the monarch's annual
broadcast to the nation has fallen below 10 million.
Despite a blip in 1997 when 12.8 million people tuned in to see what the
Queen would say about the death of Diana, Princess of Wales, its ratings in
recent years have been in steady decline. It drew 20 million viewers in 1991
when ITV ran the message during a special episode of Coronation Street,
13.9 million five years ago and 10.5 million last year.
The dwindling popularity of the Queen's message coincided with a reported
halving in the size of the crowd who turned out to see her and other members
of the Royal Family at their Christmas church outing at Sandringham. The
Queen was only slightly more popular than The Royle Family, which attracted
more than eight million viewers.
However, this year, the speech's poor ratings also reflected a general malaise
in Christmas Day viewing as figures fell sharply on 1999. Broadcasters
blamed the growing popularity of computer games. Amid criticism that the
two main channels had already used many of their best Christmas comedies
and drama in the ratings battle following the move of BBC1's Nine O'Clock
News to 10pm, only 24.2 million people bothered to watch at peak time on
Christmas Day. That compared to 26.9 million last year.
Despite relying on an unimaginative mix of soaps and the quiz show Who
Wants To Be A Millionaire, ITV narrowly managed to beat its main rival,
winning an average 9.8 million viewers - equivalent to 40.2 per cent of the
audience - between 6.30pm and 10pm compared to 9.6 million who chose
the more eclectic mix of programmes on BBC1.
BBC1 won more viewers over the day, although its wisdom in spending an
estimated £6 million to show Titanic looked questionable when the three-hour
film attracted 9.9 million viewers. It was beaten by Coronation Street,
EastEnders, Who Wants To Be A Millionaire and even the ITV news.
Although a BBC spokesman claimed that they were delighted by Titanic's
performance, ITV insiders said the BBC1 had almost as many viewers at the
same time last year when it showed the film Jumanji, but paid only £1 million
for it. Lorraine Heggessey, the controller of BBC1, said: "Success is not just
about ratings, it's about a rich and varied schedule that all generations can
enjoy. It's good that BBC1 and ITV offered different viewing experiences
which together provided something for everyone."
Both Buckingham Palace and the main broadcasters insisted yesterday that
there were no plans to reassess the Queen's televised message. A BBC
spokesman pointed out that repeats of the speech on BBC2 and Channel 4
attracted a further 1.4 million viewers. A Buckingham Palace spokesman said
that the Queen had broadcast a Christmas message in every year of her reign
apart from 1969 when it coincided with a documentary about the Royal
Family.
At the time, the Palace was inundated with complaints from viewers wanting
to know what had happened to the message.