Peter Kay’s iPlayer sitcom débuts on BBC1 with 5.7m viewers
Wednesday night saw one of the country’s best-loved stand-up comedians dive back into the realm of sitcoms as Peter Kay’s Car Share (9:30pm) pulled in a pretty impressive audience for BBC One, despite the entire series being available on the iPlayer for two days.
The Lancashire lad, who is mainly accountable for the fact that Paddy McGuinness appears on your telly every now and then, co-wrote this tale of mismatched colleagues caught up in a nightmare carpooling situation.
The claustrophobic and slow-burning sitcom, which is mainly set in a car, aims to provide some cheap laughs alongside a subtle character study, with each episode revealing small details about Kay’s supermarket employee and his gobby co-worker played by Sian Gibson.
Even though all six episodes had already débuted online, that didn’t stop the former Brian Chelsea Potter’s latest project from being the biggest show in its time slot. A whopping 5.7 million viewers tuned in for the first slice of northern commuting fun, resulting in a 27% share.
Just beforehand on the same channel, Inspector George Gently (BBC One, 8pm) returned for a seventh series of regional crime solving adventures. The hour and a half episode, in which prostitutes were popping up dead all over the place, netted 5.8 million viewers and a 28% share.
Over on Channel 4, the men’s camp was starting to crack on the latest The Island with Bear Grylls at 9pm. 2.1 million viewers (a 10% share) tuned in to see one particular castaway listening to the voices in his head and having a bit of an Apocalypse Now moment.
ITV’s hour of hilarity continued to bring in modest numbers with the celebrity obsessed Newzoids (9pm) bringing in 1.8 million viewers and a 9% share while The Delivery Man was watched by 1.1 million viewers and a 5% share.
Over on BBC Two, Lord Sugar’s former aides spent an hour looking miserable and pointing out the blatantly obvious on overcrowded railways in Nick and Margaret: The Trouble with Trains (9pm). 1 million viewers spent their Wednesday night going along for the miserable ride, netting a 5% share.
On Channel 5, Autopsy: The Last Hours of… (9pm) zoomed in on another tragedy, with the murders of Nicole Brown Simpson and her friend Ron Goldman taking centre stage. The grim proceedings netted 672,000 viewers and a 3% share.
At 10pm, the second series of Inside No 9 (BBC Two) came to an end with 682,000 viewers and a 4% share while the finale of First Dates‘ (Channel 4) third series was watched by 1.3 million viewers and was the most mentioned show on Twitter.
At 7pm, Emmerdale (ITV) managed to secure fourth place (pushed down from its usual Wednesday night spot by BBC One’s two prime time offerings) with 5.4 million viewers and a 31% share.
Straight up afterwards, Coronation Street (ITV, 7:30pm) secured the top spot as Sarah Platt and her incessant offspring continued to collectively irritate the viewing nation. 6.3 million viewers tuned in to see Sarah lock lips with inert bad bay Callum, resulting in a 33% share.
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. Overnight data supplied by TRP are based on 15 minute slot averages. This may differ from tape checked figures, which are based on a programme’s actual start and end time.
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