The Masked Singer Falls to Season Low Viewership With Controversial Rudy Giuliani Unmasking

After months of criticism and anticipation, “The Masked Singer” episode featuring the unmasking of Rudy Giuliani finally aired Wednesday on Fox. The show’s installment with the disgraced former mayor of New York City and former personal attorney for President Donald Trump, got a 0.6 demo rating and 3.6 million total viewers, according to fast-affiliate Nielsen data.

Viewership for Season 7 has been in flux since its March 9 premiere, with the Fox celebrity singing competition drawing a season high 4.3 million viewers on March 30, only to reach a season low of 3.9 million last Wednesday — which was beat by last night’s new low. “The Masked Singer’s” demo has also taken a hit, going from a 1.0 with the seventh-season opener down to a 0.6 for the week-ago episode, which it matched this week.

Last night’s 8 p.m. airing of “The Masked Singer” was easily bested by its time-slot competition CBS’ “Survivor” and NBC’s “Chicago Med” in audience size. “Survivor” had a 0.8 rating and 5.2 million viewers, while “Chicago Med” had a 0.6 and 6.5 million. “Masked Singer” did manage to top the 8 o’clock programming blocks on ABC, with the “The Golbergs” and “The Wonder Years” combining to draw a 0.4 and 2.3 million viewers for the hour, and The CW network, which got 895,000 viewers and a 0.1 rating for its special “Freddie Mercury: The Final Act.”

Final numbers for Wednesday primetime will be available later Thursday, and Variety will update this story at that time.

To date, this season of “The Masked Singer” has averaged a 0.7 rating among adults 18-49 and 4.1 million total viewers in Live + Same Day Nielsen data. In “most current” data, which includes a week’s worth of delayed viewing, “The Masked Singer” rises to an average of 5.9 million viewers.

On Wednesday’s “The Masked Singer,” Giuliani, disguised as the contestant Jack in the Box, sang “Bad to the Bone” by George Thorogood and the Destroyers. His character received the fewest votes and was cut from the lineup and unmasked at the end of the episode, which promoted panelist Ken Jeong to say, “I’m done,” and leave the set.

“With all of the controversy that’s surrounding you right now I think it surprises us all that you’re here on ‘The Masked Singer,” host Nick Cannon said, with Giuliani adding: “Me too.”

Giuliani said on stage “the main reason” he decided to do “The Masked Singer” — a Fox casting choice that received enormous backlash when it was first leaked by Deadline earlier this year — is because he just had a granddaughter. “I want her to know that you should try everything, even things that are completely unlike you and unlikely,” Giuliani said. “I couldn’t think of anything more unlike me and unlikely than this. And I enjoy the show, I have for years, and it just seemed like it would be fun. I don’t get to have a lot of fun.”

More to come…

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