‘Bodyguard’ Breaks iPlayer Records, Peaks at 11m Viewer High!
I think there will be some celebrating at BBC One today, as viewing figures for last night’s stunning finale of ‘Bodyguard‘ tips 11m viewers (avg. 10.4m), lands a 47.8% audience share, and smashes iPlayer records. Written and created by Jed Mercurio, and made by World Productions for BBC One, ‘Bodyguard’ also attracted the highest young audience for any drama on any channel this year, with the finale attracting 1.3m 16-34-year-olds (42.3% share).
“At a time when we’re told that linear TV is dying, it’s been thrilling to see the number of viewers flocking to watch Bodyguard live. We’re so grateful for all their support,” commented Simon Heath, CEO & Creative Director of World Productions.
Over on BBC iPlayer, ‘Bodyguard’ has broken records with episode 1 being the biggest episode of any programme ever on iPlayer with 7.3m requests so far. The series currently has over 24.2m requests across all six episodes, while the series finale helped drive BBC iPlayer’s biggest ever day of over 12.6m requests on Sunday 23 September.
“I’m completely stunned by the exceptional response to Bodyguard which reflects the star quality of our brilliant cast led by Richard Madden and Keeley Hawes and our outstanding crew led by producers Priscilla Parish and Eric Coulter and directors Thomas Vincent and John Strickland,” adds creator Jed Mercurio.
Set in and around the corridors of power, ‘Bodyguard’ tells the fictional story of David Budd (Madden), a heroic but volatile war veteran now working as a Specialist Protection Officer for the Royalty and Specialist Protection Branch (RaSP) of London’s Metropolitan Police Service. When he is assigned to protect the ambitious and powerful Home Secretary Julia Montague (Hawes), whose politics stand for everything he despises, Budd finds himself torn between his duty and his beliefs. Responsible for her safety, is he actually her biggest threat?
If you somehow haven’t caught ‘Bodyguard‘ yet, the series will remain on BBC iPlayer exclusively in the UK as a box set for the next six months. Outside of the UK, the drama will be coming to Netflix for international viewers on 24 October 2018.
