Huge audience for Simpsons episode

Ricky Gervais’s episode of The Simpsons has attracted the second biggest audience ever to watch Sky One.

A total of 2.2 million people tuned in to the show at 6.30pm last night, or 15.3 per cent of all the viewers in homes with digital, cable or satellite TV.

The only show on the channel ever to achieve a better figure was an episode of Friends in January 2000, which had 2.8 million viewers.

Sunday’s much-hyped Simpsons episode was written by Gervais as well as his voice, as a character remarkably similar to The Office’s David Brent who becomes besotted with Marge while filming a Wife Swap-style reality show.

Published: 24 Apr 2006