America’s Got Talent Opens to Strong Ratings

The fifth season of NBC’s “America’s Got Talent” opened to good ratings on Tuesday night, winning its time slot for the entire two-hour opener and garnering 13 percent higher ratings than last summer’s premiere. Episode two will be shown Wednesday night.

For the 8 o’clock hour, “Talent” bested both ABC’s preview of “Wipeout” and Fox’s “Hell’s Kitchen.” In the 9 o’clock hour, it also topped Fox’s “Glee.” At its peak, the 9:30 time slot, the show attracted a 4.2 rating in the important 18-49 demographic that advertisers covet. More than 13.5 million people were watching by that time.

Those are good numbers for a show that was worried about life without David Hasselhoff, who left after four seasons as a judge. Hasselhoff is slated to host a new television show. Replacing him on “America’s Got Talent” is Howie Mandel, the comedian and actor well-known for hosting the popular “Deal or No Deal” game show. Piers Morgan and Sharon Osbourne have remained in their judging roles and Nick Cannon returns as host.

Tuesday night’s show focused on auditions from Los Angeles, as viewers watched a number of contestants advance to the main competition. Wednesday night’s show will continue following the audition process, this time in Dallas. The following two episodes, scheduled to be aired on June 8 and June 9, will continue the audition process before viewers see the start of the actual competition later this season.

“America’ Got talent” airs at 9 p.m. EST on NBC.