Benidorm makes strong return, Teenage Kicks slower

ITV1's new sitcom line up make a successful launch last Friday. The second series of Derren Litten's Benidorm pulled in an impressive 6.5 million viewers.

This figure is 1.2 million more than its season one debut last February 2007, and 4.2 million more than watched the final episode of Moving Wallpaper which occupied the 9pm slot the week before.

The Spanish holiday comedy, which features performances from the likes of Johnny Vegas, Nicolas Burns, Abigail Cruttenden and The League of Gentlemen's Steve Pemberton attracted an average audience share of 28% between 9pm and 9.30pm, according to unofficial overnight figures.

The traditional studio-based sitcom Teenage Kicks which followed half-an-hour later didn't manage to attract quite such a large audience. Many were likely to have been put off by the bad press previews. That said, Adrian Edmondson's sitcom still managed to attract 3.6 million (a 16% share); a figure slightly higher than the slot's recent average, and 1.6 million more than the audience Echo Beach limped home with last week.

Statistics show the first episode of any comedy series tends to attract a larger audience than subsequent episodes so it remains to be seen whether the two comedies will be able to maintain, or grow their audience share over subsequent weeks. ITV1 bosses will no doubt be keeping their fingers crossed an audience share is maintained because the comedies will be occupying their prime-time Friday night schedule for another seven weeks.

Viewers can catch up on any episodes of Benidorm or Teenage Kicks which they have missed via ITV's now improved free broadband catch-up service.