Fox’s Two Newest Weekday Shows – Hosted By Jesse Watters And Greg Gutfeld

Mel Gibson sat down on Friday for a conversation with Fox News Channel’s Jesse Watters about his new movie Father Stu — a chat during which the host of Jesse Watters Primetime also tried (unsuccessfully) to get a comment from Gibson about the Will Smith Oscars slap controversy.

That moment came at the end of Gibson promoting the new movie in which he plays the father of the titular Stuart Long, a boxer-turned-priest played in the biopic by Mark Wahlberg. An off-camera female voice cut in before Gibson could answer the question about the Oscars slap and told Watters: “Hello, Jesse? Uhm, Thank you. That’s our time.” Watters had tried asking Gibson if the actor thinks he’d have been treated the same way if he, instead of Smith, had slapped comedian Chris Rock during the 94th Academy Awards ceremony.

Even though it’s been almost a week since the incident, the question wasn’t entirely out of left field. An hour or so prior, news broke of Smith’s resignation from the Academy as a voting remember. More interesting, though, is the fact that Gibson had decided to appear on Watters’ program in the first place to market Father Stu, which is set to be released later this month in the US.

Gibson’s choice of interviewer probably had something to do with the fact that, per Nielsen Media Research, Jesse Watters Primetime is the fastest-growing program in cable news since its launch on January 24 of this year.

Most-watched, and fastest-growing

Watters in fact dominates his time slot on Fox, where he has the most-watched program in all of cable at 7 pm ET in both total viewers as well as the younger A25-54 demo. In terms of the former, Jesse Watters Primetime is averaging 3.1 million viewers, and 517,000 in A25-54 (more than CNN and MSNBC combined).

Watters’ ratings leadership was one of the standout data points in Fox News’ overall first quarter ratings performance, a period in which the cable news network was the only one to make year-over-year ratings gains. The three-month period that kicked off 2022, which saw CNN and MSNBC continuing to experience ratings declines, also saw Fox notch its 81st consecutive quarter as the most-watched network in all of basic cable.

Part of that is attributable to an experiment on Fox’s part that has paid off well: Giving new programming slots to both Watters, as well as The Five’s Greg Gutfeld (whose show Gutfeld! will hit its one-year mark on Tuesday, April 5).

Like Watters’, Gutfeld’s is also the highest-rated program in all of cable news on the basis of total views during its hour, at 11 pm ET. Gutfeld!, featuring the veteran Fox host’s signature brand of acerbic humor, is also noteworthy for the way it quickly shook up the late-night landscape upon its debut. While the content of both of these programs — Fox’s two newest weekday shows — leans heavily on conservative-friendly political commentary, Gutfeld’s is a bit lighter, with more of the banter and shtick associated with late-night TV.

Shaking up late-night

And, more importantly, Gutfeld! found a void in the market. Because since its launch in April 2021, the show has averaged almost 2 million viewers and 347,000 in the younger demo. The program soon found itself the second highest-rated in late-night, routinely topping ABC’s Jimmy Kimmel Live! and NBC’s The Tonight Show with Jimmy Fallon.

Data from Nielsen MRI Fusion also shows that the audience for Gutfeld! is more ideologically diverse — comprising more Democrats, Republicans, and self-styled independents — than any CNN program.

The other factor behind the success thus far of both Gutfeld’s and Watters’ shows, meanwhile, has to do with the fact that Fox News Channel not only gave them a time slot of their own — but one wherein they can do the thing which viewers know them best for and clearly want to see more of. For Watters, in other words, it’s political commentary. Gutfeld’s audience, meanwhile, expects humor, and so the host during his late-night slot is there to be comparatively more entertaining than Watters’ commentary-driven show.

Fox vs. CNN

Contrast that with some recent changes over at CNN, which on March 29 saw the high-profile launch of its new streaming service CNN+ finally come to fruition.

The Fox rival not only went on a big hiring spree for its new paid subscription-based service, in addition to pouring millions of dollars of investment into it. CNN also tapped its biggest draws, including anchors like Anderson Cooper and Jake Tapper, to host shows for CNN+.

But CNN — unlike how Fox had Watters and Gutfeld stick to their knitting — is betting that while Cooper and Tapper are known for hard-hitting journalism chops, they’ll also be able to draw viewers with content that’s a bit different. In Tapper’s case, he’s hosting a book club show for the streaming service, while Cooper’s fronting not one but two programs for CNN+.

They include Anderson Cooper Full Circle, during which the newsman will interview “authors, entertainers, mindfulness experts and community leaders,” with a special focus on stories outside of the nation’s capital. The second show is a parenting program, Parental Guidance with Anderson Cooper.