‘Dancing With the Stars’ cuts in right near the top

Last week made clear America’s tastes in prime-time entertainment: dancing, singing and canoodling doctors.

Fox’s two “American Idol” episodes held their customary spot at the top of the Nielsen Media Research rankings released Tuesday, joined by the revival of ABC’s “Dancing With the Stars,” which started its fourth season with nearly 22 million viewers -- its best series premiere.

ABC’s “Grey’s Anatomy” was the only other TV series to attract more than 20 million viewers last week.

The NCAA men’s basketball tournament enabled CBS to hand Fox a rare ratings defeat during the months that “American Idol” airs. Fox still won handily among the 18-to-49-year-old demographic that advertisers seek.

For the week that ended Sunday, CBS averaged 11.4 million viewers, edging Fox with 11.2 million.

The trend of diminishing viewership for beauty pageants continued, with NBC’s coverage of Friday’s Miss USA contest from Hollywood’s Kodak Theatre drawing a record-low 7.39 million viewers. The previous low for Miss USA was 7.6 million in 2002. A record 38.11 million watched the 1979 pageant.

In the network news competition, ABC’s “World News” won for the fifth time in the last seven weeks, averaging 8.4 million viewers.

NBC’s “Nightly News” had 8.1 million and the “CBS Evening News” had 6.7 million.

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Here are the rankings for national prime-time network television last week (March 19 to 25) as compiled by Nielsen Media Research. They are based on the average number of people who watched a program from start to finish. Nielsen estimates there are 283.5 million potential viewers in the U.S. ages 2 and older. Viewership is listed in millions.

*--* Program Net- work View- ers Program Net- work View- ers

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*--* 1 American Idol (Tue.) FOX 29.96 2 American Idol (Wed.) FOX 27.08 3 Grey’s Anatomy (Thu.) ABC 22.30 4 Dancing With the Stars ABC 21.80 5 CSI: Miami CBS 17.66

6 NCIS CBS 15.69 7 Criminal Minds CBS 15.19 8 ‘Til Death FOX 14.88 9 Deal or No Deal (Mon.) NBC 14.19 10 Cold Case CBS 13.90

11 CSI: NY CBS 13.64 12 Survivor: Fiji (Wed.) CBS 12.78 13 Without a Trace CBS 12.74 14 60 Minutes CBS 12.63 15 Extreme Makeover: Home Edition ABC 12.30

16 Lost ABC 12.22 17 The Unit CBS 11.97 18 24 FOX 11.80 19 Two and a Half Men CBS 11.68 20 October Road ABC 11.50

21 Are You Smarter Than a 5th Grader? FOX 10.82 22 Amazing Race 11 CBS 10.58 23 Bones FOX 10.46 24 Ugly Betty ABC 10.41 25 NCAA Basketball Tournament (Sat.) CBS 10.22

26 CSI (Tue.) CBS 10.20 27 NCAA Basketball Tournament (Thu., 9:50 p.m.) CBS 9.93 28 Deal or No Deal (Sun.) NBC 9.65 29 NCAA Basketball Tournament (Fri., 9:45 p.m.) CBS 9.41 30 Rules of Engagement CBS 9.26

31 Boston Legal ABC 9.14 32 NCAA Basketball Tournament (Thu., 7 p.m.) CBS 8.98 33 Raines NBC 8.71 34 America’s Funniest Home Videos (Sun.) ABC 8.43 35 Prison Break FOX 8.40

36 48 Hours Mystery (10:30 p.m.) CBS 8.34 37 NCAA Basketball Tournament (Fri., 7 p.m.) CBS 8.13 38 Family Guy (Sun.) FOX 7.97 39 NCAA Basketball Tournament postgame (Sat.) CBS 7.96 40 House FOX 7.93

41 20/20 ABC 7.59 42 Law & Order: Criminal Intent (Sat.) NBC 7.51 43 Law & Order: SVU NBC 7.50 44 “Miss USA 2007” NBC 7.39 45 How I Met Your Mother CBS 7.27

46 The Simpsons FOX 6.97 47 Grease: You’re the One That I Want NBC 6.91 48 Law & Order (Sat.) NBC 6.90 49 Apprentice 6 NBC 6.82 50 Old Christine CBS 6.74

51 My Name Is Earl NBC 6.73 52 48 Hours Mystery (9:30 p.m.) CBS 6.67 53 American Dad (Sun.) FOX 6.64 54 Identity NBC 6.47 55 Scrubs NBC 6.44

56 What About Brian ABC 6.43 57 Law & Order: Criminal Intent (Tue.) NBC 6.37 58 Desperate Housewives ABC 6.20 59 Crossing Jordan NBC 6.15 60 America’s Most Wanted FOX 6.12

61 King of the Hill FOX 6.08 62 According to Jim (8:30 p.m.) ABC 5.99 63 Medium NBC 5.95 64 George Lopez ABC 5.92 65 Dateline: NBC (Sat.) NBC 5.83

66 Cops (8:30 p.m.) FOX 5.76 67 Dateline: NBC (Tue.) NBC 5.62 68 Black Donnellys NBC 5.53 69 According to Jim (9 p.m.) ABC 5.42 70 Friday Night Lights NBC 5.39

71 America’s Funniest Home Videos (Tue.) ABC 5.35 72 Andy Barker P.I. NBC 5.33 73 La Fea Mas Bella (Mon.) UNI 5.18 74 In Case of Emergency ABC 5.13 75 The Wedding Bells FOX 5.05

76 America’s Top Model 2 (Wed.) CW 5.04 77 Primetime: The Outsiders ABC 5.01 78 Grey’s Anatomy (Fri.) ABC 5.00 79 Dateline: NBC (Sun.) NBC 4.91 80 Family Guy (Thu.) FOX 4.89

81 Cops (8 p.m.) FOX 4.88 82 La Fea Mas Bella (Tue.) UNI 4.83 83 Friday Night Smackdown CW 4.76 84 Mundo de Fieras (Fri.) UNI 4.65 85 Six Degrees ABC 4.45

86 La Fea Mas Bella (Fri.) UNI 4.44 87 La Fea Mas Bella (Wed.) UNI 4.43 88 Mundo de Fieras (Mon.) UNI 4.41 89 La Fea Mas Bella (Thu.) UNI 4.35 90 Brothers & Sisters ABC 4.28

91 Mundo de Fieras (Tue.) UNI 4.14 “Coyote Ugly” ABC 4.14 93 Mundo de Fieras (Thu.) UNI 4.08 94 Smallville CW 4.07 95 Mundo de Fieras (Wed.) UNI 4.01

96 American Dad (Thu.) FOX 3.86 97 War at Home (7:30 p.m.) FOX 3.56 98 Aqui y Ahora UNI 3.52 99 Supernatural CW 3.38 100 Duelo de Pasiones (Mon.) UNI 3.33

101 Bailando Boda Suenos UNI 3.27 102 Pussycat Dolls Present: The Search for the Next Doll CW 3.13 (Wed.) 103 Pussycat Dolls Present: The Search for the Next Doll CW 3.12 (Tue.) 104 Duelo de Pasiones (Wed.) UNI 3.09 105 Ver Para Creer UNI 3.00

106 Duelo de Pasiones (Fri.) UNI 2.99 Don Francisco Presenta UNI 2.99 108 Duelo de Pasiones (Tue.) UNI 2.93 109 Duelo de Pasiones (Thu.) UNI 2.88 Cristina UNI 2.88

111 Casos Vida UNI 2.80 112 War at Home (7 p.m.) FOX 2.78 113 “Celebrity Debut” ABC 2.69 114 Everybody Hates Chris CW 2.53 115 Sabado Gigante UNI 2.37

116 All of Us CW 2.35 117 Girlfriends CW 2.15 118 The Game CW 2.14 119 Gilmore Girls CW 2.07 120 Hora Pico UNI 1.87

121 America’s Top Model (Sun.) CW 1.77 122 Pussycat Dolls Present: The Search for the Next Doll CW 1.59 (Sun.) 123 Casos Familia UNI 1.57 124 7th Heaven CW 1.38 125 Zorro (Mon.) TEL 1.22

126 Zorro (Wed.) TEL 1.21 127 Zorro (Tue.) TEL 1.17 128 Dame Chocolate (Mon.) TEL 1.07 129 Zorro (Thu.) TEL 1.02 130 Dame Chocolate (Thu.) TEL 0.99

Dame Chocolate (Tue.) TEL 0.99 132 Marina (Tue.) TEL 0.97 133 Marina (Thu.) TEL 0.96 134 Marina (Mon.) TEL 0.95 135 Decisiones (Tue.) TEL 0.94

136 Marina (Wed.) TEL 0.93 137 Zorro (Fri.) TEL 0.92 138 Marina (Fri.) TEL 0.90 139 Dame Chocolate (Wed.) TEL 0.89 140 Cine Millonario TEL 0.88

141 Decisiones (Mon.) TEL 0.82 142 Decisiones (Fri.) TEL 0.81 143 Decisiones (Wed.) TEL 0.78 144 Dame Chocolate (Fri.) TEL 0.77 145 Decisiones (Thu.) TEL 0.66

146 Cine en Familia TEL 0.56 147 Vas o no Vas TEL 0.51 148 “RBD en Concierto” TEL 0.47 149 Seguro y Urgente TEL 0.26

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Network averages

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Here is the number of viewers (in millions) that each network averaged per hour of prime time, for last week and for the season.

*--* Network Last week Season to date CBS 11.44 12.83

FOX 11.22 10.20

ABC 8.98 9.84

NBC 7.36 9.41

UNI 3.59 3.61

CW 3.05 3.26

TEL 0.85 0.85

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