Kings: NBC’s Silverman Still Has Hope for Low-Rated Drama

Sunday’s premiere of Kings was less than impressive in terms of ratings, especially considering the amount of promotion and money that NBC poured into it. Not even the prospect of seeing Deadwood’s Ian McShane in another series could draw in a big audience.

While things don’t look good for Kings’ future, NBC Entertainment’s co-chair Ben Silverman says he’s encouraged by the interest in the series and has faith that the show can pull through.

He tells the Hollywood Reporter’s James Hibberd, “I’m hoping because intent [to view] went up and awareness went up after it aired, clearly people responded to it, and it grew over its two hours. That gives me some hope. It’s just hard to launch things that are not obvious. We may get nailed for it, but I’m proud of the show, and we need to keep taking chances like that.”

Though his faith in the show is reassuring for the show’s fans, Silverman’s comment about the show’s audience growth over the two hour premiere is a bit misleading.

While the 18-49 demographic had slight increase in the show’s final half hour, the overall size of the audience dropped. Approximately 6.47 million started watching at 8pm and only 5.9 million stuck with it until the end. That’s not growth. Even if it was, the show was still in fourth place overall.

So, will Silverman and the network stick by Kings or abandon it? One thing is certain. The show certainly has an uphill battle for survival.