'Celebrity Wife Swap' gets biggest ratings ever with Kate Gosselin

Kate Gosselin and Kendra Wilkinson set a ratings record for ABC on Tuesday night, while CBS’ latest detective drama delivered less-than golden numbers.

The second season premiere of ABC’s Celebrity Wife Swap saddled Playboy pinup Wilkinson with Gosselin’s famed mega-litter (if only you could buy patience at Costco). The show was seen by 7 million viewers and had a 2.4 rating among adults 18-49. That’s up 4 percent from last year’s preview of the celebrity version of Wife Swap last year (and up 14 percent from last year’s regular Tuesday premiere) and represents an all-time high for the show among both viewers and the demo. Next week, “wives” Coolio and Mark McGrath do a swap.

CBS had a premiere last night too — Golden Boy, the story of one detective’s rise to fame. The drama had 10.5 million viewers and a 1.8 rating in the demo. The show easily ruled its 10 p.m. time slot, but its competition was NBC’s Smash and ABC’s Body of Proof so … no trophy for pummeling those two. The episode was technically a “preview” instead of a premiere even though the drama will also air its second episode in this slot next week. Golden Boy then moves to Fridays at 9 p.m.

Also Tuesday, ABC’s The Taste, despite shifting to 9 p.m. and gaining a strong lead-in from Celebrity Wife Swap, fell to its lowest numbers ever. Body of Proof was flat with last week’s premiere. CBS’ NCIS was basically steady to rank as the night’s top show and NCIS: LA was up 7 percent. NBC was more or-less flat, with everything at a series low except New Normal. The CW and Fox were pretty much unchanged too.

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