Colbert Reaches Another Latenight Milestone

NEW YORK (AP) — Stephen Colbert hit another milestone in his stunning late-night turnaround against Jimmy Fallon of NBC’s “Tonight” show.

Colbert won in the Nielsen company’s ratings for the ninth consecutive time last week, his margin of 400,000 viewers the widest lead since the CBS star overtook Fallon with a sharp concentration on politics. Fallon aired a rerun Friday; otherwise the shows were all fresh last week.

More ominously for NBC, Colbert tied Fallon among viewers aged 25-to-54 for the first time, encroaching on younger viewers who are more valuable to advertisers.

Fallon had been the unquestioned latenight king until the advent of the Trump administration, and he’s been struggling to regain his footing.

Boosted by the NCAA tournament, CBS dominated last week with an average of 9.7 million viewers in primetime. NBC had 5.3 million, ABC had 4.4 million, Fox had 2.7 million, Univision had 1.5 million, the CW had 1.39 million, Telemundo had 1.35 million and ION Television had 1.2 million.

Fox News Channel was the week’s most popular cable network, averaging 2.27 million viewers in prime time. MSNBC had 1.69 million, ESPN had 1.61 million, USA had 1.55 million and HGTV had 1.48 million.

ABC’s “World News Tonight” topped the evening newscasts with an average of 8 million viewers. NBC’s “Nightly News” had 7.8 million and the “CBS Evening News” had 6.8 million.

The Top 20

Primetime viewership numbers compiled by Nielsen for March 27-April 2. Listings include the week’s ranking and viewership.

1. NCAA Men’s Basketball: Oregon vs. North Carolina, CBS, 18.83 million.

2. “NCAA Studio Show,” CBS, 16.03 million.

3. “NCIS,” CBS, 14.35 million.

4. “The Big Bang Theory,” CBS, 12.78 million.

5. “The Walking Dead,” AMC, 11.31 million.

6. “Dancing With the Stars,” ABC, 11.12 million.

7. “ACM Awards,” CBS, 10.91 million.

8. “Bull,” CBS, 10.9 million.

9. “The Voice” (Monday), NBC, 10.56 million.

10. “The Voice” (Tuesday), NBC, 10.22 million.

11. “Blue Bloods,” CBS, 9.62 million.

12. “60 Minutes,” CBS, 9.5 million.

13. “NCIS: New Orleans,” CBS, 9.17 million.

14. “Hawaii Five-0,” CBS, 8.74 million.

15. “Little Big Shots,” NBC, 8.65 million.

16. “Survivor,” CBS, 8.26 million.

17. “Grey’s Anatomy,” ABC, 7.62 million.

18. “Mom,” CBS, 7.03 million.

19. “Empire,” Fox, 6.91 million.

20. “Criminal Minds,” CBS, 6.9 million.