TV Overnights: ITV1’s The Savoy debuts with 5.6m viewers

ITV1’s new fly-on-the-wall documentary series about the closure and re-opening of The Savoy hotel after a staggering £220 million, two year refurbishment, attracted a high of 5.6 million viewers at 9pm last night.

The first episode of the two-part series secured more than 5.2 million average viewers and a 20.3% share during the 9pm to 10pm peak-hour, seeing off competition from BBC One’s Accused.

Jimmy McGovern’s drama series pulled in 3.6 million average viewers and a 14.2% share for BBC One during the prime time slot.

Elsewhere, Channel 4’s River Cottage Christmas picked up 2.2 million viewers and a 8.8% share, while BBC Two’s Ian Hislop’s Age of the Do-Gooders attracted 1.8 million viewers and a 7.2% share.

Over on Channel 5, an average of one million viewers tuned in to watch Extreme Fishing with Robson Green between 9pm and 10pm.

Earlier on in the evening, the soaps dominated the pre-watershed ratings.  The aftermath of last week’s tram crash pulled in high numbers to ITV1’s Coronation Street – the soap peaked with more than 11.7 million viewers between 7.45pm and 8pm.  Meanwhile, BBC One’s Eastenders attracted a peak audience of 9.8 million viewers.

Overnight data is available each morning in mediatel.co.uk’s TV Database, with all BARB registered subscribers able to view reports for terrestrial networks and key multi-channel stations.