The 11th and final season of “Will & Grace” will begin Thursday, October 24 at 9:30PM ET/PT on NBC replacing “Sunnyside.”
The remaining six episodes of the 10-episode “Sunnyside” order will air weekly on the NBC App, other digital platforms and NBC.com. They are currently in production on episode nine and will finish production of all 10 episodes.
Our fall strategy was always to capitalize on the compatibility of both of Mike Schur’s “The Good Place” and “Sunnyside.” We see huge opportunity for potential on the digital side for “Sunnyside” and want to move the show exclusivity to digital.
“Sunnyside” has generated substantial increases through digital and linear delayed viewing, which has expanded the 18-49 audience of the show’s premiere episode by 150% versus its next-day rating, growing since its September 26 telecast from a “live plus same day” 0.4 rating to a 1.0. The “Sunnyside” premiere was also the second most social broadcast comedy premiere by Total Activity during Premiere Week and was NBC’s most social broadcast comedy premiere in two years.
“Sunnyside” is also generating one of television’s most upscale audiences so far this fall, with the #4 most affluent audience among primetime broadcast series (with a 138 index among adults 18-49 living in homes with $100K+ incomes, 100 represents an average concentration of those homes) and the #3 most educated audience (with a 146 index among adults 18-49 with four or more years of college).
Last season “Will & Grace” averaged a 1.5 rating in adults 18-49 and 5.3 million viewers in “live plus seven day” averages from Nielsen Media Research, to build on its timeslot lead-in by +1.7 million persons or +48% in total viewers (5.3 million vs. 3.6 million). After 35 days of digital and linear delayed viewing, those “Will & Grace” season averages grew to 2.3 rating in 18-49 and 6.9 million viewers overall. Through the season, the series reached more than 30 million people.
The series has earned an astonishing 91 Emmy Award nominations, 18 Emmy wins (including Outstanding Comedy Series) and seven SAG Awards among dozens of other kudos. In addition, the show is one of the few in TV history where each member of the cast won an Emmy.
“Will & Grace” also scored as one of the season’s top comedies in digital and social performance, ranking as the season’s #4 most-viewed primetime scripted broadcast comedy series (short form videos), delivering 72 million views across YouTube and Facebook (Source: ListenFirst Media. LF // TV UNIVERSE // EPISODIC universe; 9/1/18-8/31/19. ListenFirst Video Views [YouTube + Facebook]; Prime Time Daypart; in-season TV shows, Broadcast, TV-Shows). It was also the #4 most-social primetime comedy, achieving 1.7 million total interactions across Facebook, Twitter and Instagram (Source: Nielsen Social SCR, Primetime Daypart, 09/24/18-05/24/19, Broadcast Only, Comedy Series).
Additionally, “Will & Grace” generated one of primetime television’s most upscale and most educated audiences, ranking #5 among Big 4 comedies in the concentration of adults 18-49 with four or more years of college (138 index, 100 represents an average concentration) and was the #6 comedy in adults 18-49 living in homes with $100K+ incomes (131).
“Will & Grace stars Eric McCormack, Debra Messing, Megan Mullally and Sean Hayes.
Max Mutchnick and David Kohan write and executive produce. James Burrows directs and executive produces. “Will & Grace” is produced by Universal Television.
