ABC’s live (or semi-live) musical adaptation of The Little Mermaid made a splash in the TV ratings on Tuesday night.
The show scored a 2.6 rating among adults 18-49 and just under 9 million total viewers, solid numbers for a live TV musical. For comparison, Fox’s “Rent” live musical event only drew a 1.4 rating and 3.4 million total viewers back in January, and NBC’s “Jesus Christ Superstar Live” from 2018 drew slightly more viewers at a touch over 9 million, but a smaller rating at a 1.7. Last night’s performance featuring Auli’i Cravalho, Shaggy and Queen Latifah among others was the highest-rated made-for-TV musical on any network in almost four years (since Fox’s “Grease” aired in Jan. 2016).
The Little Mermaid Live was fins and tails above the competition last night in terms of rating, but the crown for the most watched show still went to “NCIS” on CBS with 10.7 million total viewers. Emergence followed it up with a 0.7 rating (its highest since the premiere) and 3.5 million total viewers (a four-week high), meaning that the Disney-owned network comfortably finished ahead of its rivals with a 2.0 average ratings across the night.
NBC came second overall, led by The Voice with a 1.3 rating and 8.1 million total viewers. This Is Us declined once again up against The Little Mermaid, dipping to a 1.3 rating and 6.7 million total viewers. New Amsterdam scored a 0.7.
On CBS, NCIS posted a 1.0, FBI a 0.8 and NCIS: New Orleans a 0.7. Meanwhile on Fox, “The Resident” and “Empire” tied at a 0.7, with the former drawing 3.4 million sets of eyeballs and the latter 2.5.
Finally on the CW, The Flash came in at a 0.4 and 1.2 million viewers, and Arrow posted a 0.2.
