NEW YORK — Did Tony help whack the Tonys? Viewership of Sunday’s 2007 Tony Awards telecast on CBS was 6.24 million, down 17 percent from last year, according to preliminary figures released Monday by the network, with a 4.2 rating and 7 share of the audience.
If that holds up when the final numbers are announced Tuesday, it will be the least-watched Tonys show ever. But then, between 8 and 9 p.m., the Tonys were up against the final episode of ‘‘The Sopranos’’ on HBO. ...
‘‘We always knew we had a particular challenge,’’ said Howard Sherman, executive director of the American Theatre Wing, which co-produces the Tonys. ‘‘We do know that while we were down from prior years, we also know that CBS overall still did very strongly for the night, relative to the other networks.
‘‘It is not every Sunday night in June that one of most acclaimed series in television history comes to an end,’’ Sherman added. ‘‘We applaud the achievements of ‘The Sopranos’ just as we applaud the achievements of the people working on Broadway every year.’’
Last year, the ratings for the Tony Awards show improved a bit over the 2005 telecast, reaching 7.71 million viewers for a 5.2 rating and 9 share of the audience.
AP
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'Sopranos'- - What a ridiculously disappointing end
I say that any REAL Sopranos fan can be very happy with the ending Chase gave us. We are all free to let the survivors live any way we want, because it really is OUR script to write. All this BS speculation is no different than listening to albums backwards and attempting to put our own meaning into someone else's creation.
In my world, Tony and the family have a meal and go home to deal with more of the everyday problems that the boss of a crime family has to deal with. Looking over his shoulder at everyone coming into the restaurant is just part of what a guy has to do when he is Tony Soprano.
To those fair weather fans and johnny-come-lately s and 'wanna be fans' who just kind of jumped on the band-wagon, I think Tony himself put it perfectly when the fed wouldnt give him the info on where the 'would be terrorists' were..."go f$#^ yourselves!" If you people were only here for the crash, then go sit with the NASCAR fans or hit a WWF match. If you are true friends to these people that have taken us on a journey with them (albeit fictional) then why would you want a bloodbath crescendo? Go back to kicking the dog and poking zoo creatures with sticks if thats where your hearts lie. You were never part of the crew to begin with.
In my world, Tony goes about business as usual, get's old, retires and dies in his sleep of natural causes. Until David Chase says differently, this is the way it is.
$h*% happens..."Whaddaya gonna do?"