TV Ratings: ‘Labor of Love’ Labors to Poor Start, ‘Holey Moley’ Season 2 Premiere Hits the Fairway

By Will Thorne

LOS ANGELES (Variety.com) – “Labor of Love,” Fox’s new show which matches 41-year old Kristy Katzmann with 15 potential fathers to her child, debuted to pretty poor numbers on Thursday night.

The show’s premiere scored a 0.2 rating among adults 18-49 and drew only 909,000 total viewers, which represents the weakest debut of the season for Fox in both metrics. Earlier on, “Celebrity Watch Party” aired its third episode to a 0.3 rating and 1.4 million total viewers, down about 12% in audience from the week before.

ABC hit the fairway with its first drive of the summer, winning the night overall thanks partly to the season 2 premiere of mini-golf competition series “Holey Moley,” which scored a 0.8 rating and 4.4 million pairs of eyeballs. While that’s down from the season 1 debut which delivered a 1.0 rating, it’s more than double the viewership tally from its freshman season finale. Teeing up the second season, the show’s creator Chris Culvenor told Variety that this season is “bigger and there are more holes.” “To Tell The Truth” season 5 debuted to a 0.7 rating and 3.8 million viewers, while “Who Wants to Be a Millionaire?” with Jimmy Kimmel continued its run with a 0.8 rating and 6 million viewers.

“Man With a Plan” and “Broke”  ticked down a fraction from last week, with the former coming in at a 0.6 rating and 5.4 million viewers, and the latter at a 0.5 and 4.3 million. Both shows were canceled by CBS earlier this month. Replays of “Young Sheldon” and “Mom” both scored a 0.6 rating, while a “S.W.A.T.” rerun rounded off the night with a 0.4.

Over on NBC, the network’s “Celebrity Escape Room” special delivered a 0.8 rating and 3.8 million viewers, followed its “Red Nose Day” special with a 0.4 and just under 2 million viewers.

Finally on the CW, “Burden of Truth” season 3 debuted to a 0.1 rating and 619,000 viewers, its largest audience since the finale of season 1 back in 2018. “In the Dark” scored a 0.1 and 535,000 viewers.