The Eye Doctor's 'House' Call

CBS suits hope Fox's 9 p.m. drama "House," starring Hugh Laurie as a rude-but-brilliant middle-aged MD battling his own demons while mentoring/messing with bright-eyed young doctors, scores record ratings tonight.

Right after the "House" episode concludes at 10, CBS launches its new doc drama "3 Lbs." It stars Stanley Tucci as a rude but brilliant middle-aged neurosurgeon battling his own demons while mentoring/messing with a bright-eyed young doctor.

This is not a coincidence.

One of this season's biggest early surprises was the ratings resuscitation of NBC's 13-year-old ensemble doctor drama "ER" after several seasons of double-digit ratings declines.

Not coincidentally, this season, for the first time, "ER" is running immediately after ABC's enormously successful ensemble doctor drama "Grey's Anatomy."

" 'Grey's Anatomy' is the best lead-in we've had in years!" NBC entertainment division chief Kevin Reilly, speaking last month at an industry event in Beverly Hills, joked about the early-season ratings growth of "ER."

At that time, the series was averaging about 15.3 million viewers, more than a million better than the same time last season. And the ancient-by-broadcast-standards show was beating its new rivals on CBS and ABC -- James Woods starrer "Shark" and JJ Abrams-exec-produced "Six Degrees," respectively -- among the younger viewers that advertisers pay a premium to reach.

This season "ER" is NBC's most popular entertainment series and ranks No. 9 among younger viewers. Its time-slot competitors, "Six Degrees" and "Shark," are tied for 26th place.

"ER" is drafting 32 percent of its audience from "Grey's Anatomy" according to Nielsen stats -- an unusually large number to be recruited from another network. "ER" is drawing more viewers from "Grey's Anatomy" than from its own lead-in, game show "Deal or No Deal."

So when CBS decided to pull its ratings-starved "Smith" on Tuesdays at 9, it stood to reason it would try to launch "3 Lbs." in the time slot following "House." After all, Fox has nothing to offer the nearly 16 million "House" fans at 10 p.m. except local news.

"We hope 'The Unit' provides most of our lead-in, but given the fact that Fox stops programming at 10 and we have a potentially compatible show at 10, it seems to make sense," CBS scheduling chief Kelly Kahl told The TV Column.

This kind of drafting of the audience from another network's hit is not new but has been confined largely to reality programming.