As news reverberated around the world that Australian icon Olivia Newton-John had passed away aged 73, people around the country turned to her much-loved film “Grease”.
The 1978 musical film co-starring John Travolta went to air after “The Block” last night on Channel 9.
In the five metro markets of Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane, Adelaide and Perth, 442,000 people tuned in. It was most popular in Melbourne (157,000).
In addition, 176,000 regional viewers tuned in on Channel 9 and its affiliate stations, while 35,000 watched on broadcast video on demand (BVOD) platform 9Now.
This took the total overnight TV audience of “Grease” to 653,000, and made it the timeslot winner in the metro markets.
“Grease” was also featured in the content carousel on Nine’s Stan last night, however the subscription streamer does not release its viewing numbers.
The film is distributed by Paramount Pictures and is also currently featured on its streaming platform, Paramount Plus.
Stan and Paramount signed a content agreement in 2019.
The lead in to “Grease”, “The Block”, was the most-popular entertainment program on linear television last night, with 775,000 metro viewers. Nine said there were also 317,000 regional viewers and 115,000 on BVOD, taking the total to 1.207 million.
“MKR” on rival Channel 7 had 450,000 metro viewers, which climbed to 684,000 on a national basis. With the addition of 42,000 on BVOD platform 7Plus, its total was 726,000.
Channel 10’s “The Masked Singer”, meanwhile, had 449,000 in the metro markets and 637,000 nationally. Network 10 has not released its figures for streaming on 10 Play.
The ‘reveal’ segment of the episode had 782,000 nationally, with 504,000 of these hailing from the five capital cities.