Married At First Sight: Nine experiment 2019’s most-watched show

The finale of Nine’s Married At First Sight was the most-watched show so far this year.

Nine’s Married At First Sight reunion episode was the most-watched TV show in Australia so far this year. Picture: Nine

The controversial season of Nine’s Married At First Sight finished on a record ratings high, attracting more than 2.6 million viewers across Australia for the ‘reunion’ episode which saw contestants watch unseen footage from the season.

More: Married At First Sight 2019 a ratings winner for Channel 9

MAFS, which has been engulfed with wife swapping and affairs, was the most-watched program on Monday evening, with 1.968 million metropolitan viewers tuning in — an increase on last year’s finale audience of 1.900 million. It was also the highest-rating episode for the show in its six-season history.

The result also made Nine’s ‘social experiment’ the most watched show of 2019 so far, and more popular than some of 2018’s highest ratings programs, including the Australian Open Men’s Final, which had a metro audience of 1.739 million, The Melbourne Cup’s 1.908 million metropolitan viewers, and State of Origin matches.

The success of the final episode drew audiences away from Seven’s My Kitchen Rules, which was watched by 710,000 metro viewers, and Ten’s Dancing With The Stars, which had just 393,000 viewers watching in the same 7:30pm timeslot.

On Monday night, 32 per cent of total people watching television were watching Nine, compared to 18.9 per cent on Seven and 8.7 per cent on Ten.

Media analyst Steve Allen said the show made Nine a “must” for media buyers looking to invest in television, predicting it makes around $110m in advertising revenue including sponsorships.

“It is strategically important as it generates massive publicity which generate focus on Nine and its format,” Mr Allen said.

“It boosts share by opening doors and gaining a premium.”

When The Australian spoke to Nine’s head of content production and development, Adrian Swift, he said the show was a “telenovela”, with “no scripting involved”.

“The beauty of the format is that you see new people in there and it delivers every time,” he said.

“They do things that we would not even conceive of. They come up with storylines that we haven’t even thought of, and the problem we have and you’ve seen it this year, is it went to places that we thought were just a bit tawdry and we didn’t want it to go there.

“Our guiding principle is that we don’t make anything happen, but the corollary of that is if something does happen we can’t excise it from the show.”