The Wednesday night battle between the first reunion episode of Hey Hey It’s Saturday and the return of Masterchef, in the guise of a celebrity version, was well and truly won by Hey Hey.

Daryl Somers and his gathered cast of Hey Hey It’s Saturday regulars earned a massive 2.16 million viewers (average, 5 cities) over the three-hour program and helped Nine gain a 38.7 per cent of the prime time audience, almost doubling second placed Seven (21.7 per cent).  Celebrity Masterchef was well behind on 1.35 million and a repeat screening last night (Friday) was watched by another 560,000 viewers.

The Nine Network, never averse to the ‘encore presentation’ (or, to use the traditional title, ‘repeat’), had originally scheduled an ‘encore’ of Wednesday’s Hey Hey to screen tonight (Saturday) at 9.30pm – at least keeping the show’s title relevant.  Now, for reasons known only by Nine, they’ve since decided to cancel tonight’s scheduled program in favour of an Adam Sandler movie, 50 First Dates, although online listings on Nine’s own website still show Hey Hey It’s Saturday.

Viewers have long been frustrated with Nine’s last-minute ad hoc programming changes and, while Hey Hey It’s Saturday was successful in bringing many viewers across to Nine, this last minute move does nothing to help reverse that frustration.

Source: TV Tonight