TV Ratings : Spielberg’s ‘seaQuest DSV’ Sails to Sunday-Night Win

They weren’t exactly “Jurassic Park” numbers, but producer Steven Spielberg’s “seaQuest DSV” won the first Sunday-night showdown of the fall season and ranked as the second-highest-rated program of the week. Figures released Tuesday by the A.C. Nielsen Co. showed that NBC’s underwater adventure, starring Roy Scheider, was watched in about 16.8 million homes, trailing only the 19.5 million that tuned in for ABC’s “Monday Night Football.”

CBS’ “Murder, She Wrote,” the reigning champion at 8 p.m. Sundays, placed second in the time period behind “seaQuest,” while ABC newcomer “Lois & Clark: The New Adventures of Superman” was third and the Fox comedy combination of “Martin” and “Living Single” was fourth. Three other new series besides “seaQuest” finished in the Top 25: ABC’s “Thea,” at No. 11, NBC’s “The John Larroquette Show,” at No. 15, and NBC’s “Second Half,” at No. 24.

But Fox’s rookie variety show, “Townsend Television,” did not get off to such a good start. Airing opposite “60 Minutes,” it finished last among the week’s 89 prime-time network programs, attracting only 8% of the available audience.

Southland Ratings Here are A. C. Nielsen’s Top 10 prime-time programs in the Los Angeles area during the same week. Each rating point equals 50,064 households.

Program Station Rating 1. Beverly Hills, 90210 KTTV 19.8 2. seaQuest DSV KNBC 18.2 3. The Simpsons KTTV 17.0 4. Roseanne (9:30 p.m.) KABC 16.8 5. Melrose Place KTTV 15.7 6. 60 Minutes KCBS 15.1 7. Roseanne KABC 14.8 8. Home Improvement KABC 14.5 9. Seinfeld (9:30 p.m.) KNBC 14.3 10. Seinfeld KNBC 13.8

Weekly Averages

ABC 10.6

NBC 10.3

CBS 9.2

FOX 7.5