CBS flexed its strength in scripted series to sail to the top of the weekly television standings.
Of the 11 most popular dramas or comedies in prime-time last week, 10 were CBS shows, the Nielsen Co. said. ABC's "Grey's Anatomy" was the lone exception.
"NCIS," as it usually has been, was the week's most-watched show.
ABC hung tough as "Dancing With the Stars" headed toward the end of another competition. The show finished second in the ratings last week, even though its generally lackluster crop of dancers has kept ratings down for the show this season.
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The "American Music Awards," best known this year as Adam Lambert's sexual showcase, grew its audience for the third consecutive year and finished among Nielsen's top 10. The show's audience of 14.2 million was 2 million more than watched last year.
For the week, CBS averaged 11.6 million viewers (7.3 rating, 12 share) and ABC had 10 million (6.3, 10). Both networks finished in a virtual dead heat for last week's win among the coveted 18-to-49-year-old viewer. NBC averaged 7.5 million viewers (4.7, 8), Fox had 6.3 million (3.8, 6), the CW had 2.3 million (1.6, 2) and ION Television had 860,000 (0.6, 1).
Among the Spanish language networks, Univision led with a 3.7 million-viewer average in prime-time (1.9 rating, 3 share), Telemundo had 1.1 million (0.5, 1), TeleFutura had 900,000 (0.4, 1) and Azteca had 260,000 (0.2, 0).
NBC's "Nightly News" topped the evening newscasts with an average of 9 million viewers (6, 11). ABC's "World News" was second with 8.2 million (5.5, 10) and the "CBS Evening News" had 6.1 million viewers (4.1, 8).
A ratings point represents 1,149,000 households, or 1 percent of the nation's estimated 114.9 million TV homes. The share is the percentage of in-use televisions tuned to a given show.
For the week of Nov. 16-22, the top 10 shows, their networks and viewerships: "NCIS," CBS, 20.34 million; "Dancing With the Stars," ABC, 18.84 million; NFL Football: Philadelphia at Chicago, NBC, 17.33 million; "Dancing With the Stars Results," ABC, 16.02 million; "60 Minutes," CBS, 15.98 million; "The Mentalist," CBS, 15.85 million; "CSI: Crime Scene Investigation," CBS, 14.91 million; "NCIS: Los Angeles," CBS, 14.87 million; "American Music Awards," ABC, 14.24 million; "Grey's Anatomy," ABC, 14.07 million.
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ABC is owned by The Walt Disney Co. CBS is owned by CBS Corp. CW is a joint venture of Warner Bros. Entertainment and CBS Corp. Fox and My Network TV are units of News Corp. NBC and Telemundo are owned by General Electric Co. ION Television is owned by ION Media Networks. TeleFutura is a division of Univision. Azteca America is a wholly owned subsidiary of TV Azteca S.A. de C.V.
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