“Awkwafina is Nora from Queens” drew in the largest audience for a series debut on Comedy Central in over three years.
The show, which premiered on Jan. 22, had a total of 3.8 million views in Live+3 (L+3), its first three days after airing, according to Deadline.
The tally includes replays, streamings and premiere simulcast across seven ViacomCBS networks.
On average, the show logged 818,000 viewers in three days of delayed viewing — a 67% bump from the 489,000 viewers for its initial airing, according to The Hollywood Reporter.
The premiere episode — Comedy Central’s best launch in more than three years — was up 155% among Asian viewers (1.32 L+3) and up 100% among women aged 18 to 49 (.59) in L+3, according to Deadline.
Meanwhile, it drew a 0.45 rating (up 54% from L+SD or Live + Same Day rating) among persons aged 18 to 34, and a 0.52 rating (up 88% from L+SD) among women aged 18 to 34.
The episode also posted a 0.56 rating among adults aged 18 to 49 within Comedy Central’s area. Additionally, it at least doubled its initial audience among women 18 to 49 and Asian adults under 50, according to THR.
Subscribe to
NextShark's Newsletter
A daily dose of Asian America's essential stories, in under 5 minutes.
Get our collection of Asian America's most essential stories to your inbox daily for free.
Unsure? Check out our Newsletter Archive.
The show’s solid debut numbers were reflected on social media, becoming the top primetime cable comedy of the night with 39,000 social interactions across Facebook, Twitter and Instagram.
As of this writing, the pilot episode has 2.1 million views on YouTube, though the platform only tracks people who watched for at least 30 seconds (unlike Nielsen’s average viewership).
“Nora from Queens,” based on Awkwafina’s early years in the borough, stars herself, Lori Tan Chinn, B.D. Wong and Bowen Yang.
Fellow creatives celebrated the show’s premiere:
“Nora from Queens” airs Wednesdays, 10:30 EST on Comedy Central.
Feature Image Screenshots via Comedy Central
