Hallmark Channel’s staple When Calls the Heart and Bravo’s new anthology series Dirty John both set new ratings highs for their respective networks last week.
A two-hour When Calls the Heart holiday special on Dec. 25, which is kicking off the frontier drama’s sixth season, was the most watched scripted telecast on cable by a mile the week of Dec. 24-30, drawing 4.8 million viewers (Live+3). In adults 18-49 and 25-54, When Calls the Heart: The Greatest Christmas Blessing was #3 with 860,000 and 996,000 viewers, respectively.
This was the most watched/highest-rated When Calls The Heart episode ever and Hallmark’s highest rated series telecast to date. Season 6 will continue its run in February.
Meanwhile Dirty John, which already set a new benchmark as Bravo’s highest rated scripted series debut, averaged 2.9 million viewers, 1.2 million of them adults 18-49, 1.5 million adults 25-54 (Live+3) for its sixth episode on Dec. 30. It was the highest rated episode of the series across all key demos, ranking as Bravo’s highest-rated scripted series telecast ever.
Dirty John, starring Connie Britton and Eric Bana in Season 1, was the #1 scripted series on cable among all key demos last week and #1 in total viewers behind When Calls the Heart. The anthology already has been renewed for a second installment.
