newsmakers

newsmakers

Fresh reality TV was last week’s big Nielsens draw

NEW YORK

New reality fare remained a big draw on a prime-time landscape otherwise jammed with reruns.

A double whammy of “America’s Got Talent” gave NBC the week’s two most-watched shows, and a triple helping of CBS’ “Big Brother” rounded out the bottom of last week’s Top 10, according to Nielsen figures released Tuesday.

A special edition of ABC’s “20/20” focusing on the death of Robin Williams ranked sixth.

Meanwhile, CBS scored with new episodes of its scripted summer thriller “Under the Dome,” which ranked seventh, and its crime drama, “Unforgettable,” which ranked 11th. But the network’s much-hyped sci-fi mystery, “Extant,” starring Oscar-winner Halle Berry, continued to falter, ranking 17th with a lukewarm 5.7 million viewers.

Even so, CBS won the week, averaging 5.4 million viewers overall in prime time. It was CBS’ eighth such win in nine weeks. NBC was runner-up with 4.9 million, followed by ABC with 3.9 million. Univision had 3.4 million, Fox had 3.0 million, Telemundo had 1.3 million, ION Television had 1.2 million and the CW had 910,000 viewers.

Don Pardo, longtime ‘SNL’ announcer dies

NEW YORK

Television and radio announcer Don Pardo, whose booming baritone was known to fans of “Saturday Night Live,” “The Price is Right” and other programs, has died. He was 96.

Pardo’s daughter, Dona Pardo, says her father died Monday afternoon at his home in Tucson, Arizona. She says he moved to Tucson after retiring from “SNL.”

For more than 60 years, Pardo’s majestic voice graced newscasts, game shows and television programs. During shows such as the original version of “Jeopardy!,” his answers to the question, “Tell ’em what they’ve won, Don Pardo,” became a memorable part of the program.

And though rarely seen, he was an integral part of “Saturday Night Live” for nearly four decades in his role of introducing the cast to kick off each show.

Dinklage, Schilling to share NY stage

NEW YORK

An off-Broadway production of Ivan Turgenev’s “A Month in the Country” has attracted a star of “Game of Thrones” and another from behind bars.

Classic Stage Company said Tuesday that “Game of Thrones” actor Peter Dinklage and Taylor Schilling from “Orange Is The New Black” will co-star as Rakitin and Natalya in the revival, which kicks off Jan. 9.

The play, set on a country estate in 1840s Russia, deals with a bored, older and married woman who falls for a younger man, her son’s tutor, who is idolized by the woman’s vulnerable ward. Meanwhile, the older woman is worshipped by a long-suffering admirer.

The company’s other shows this season include William Shakespeare’s “Hamlet” starring Peter Sarsgaard, and Christopher Marlowe’s “Doctor Faustus,” starring “Sex in the City” star Chris Noth.

Associated Press