Celia, Telemundo’s first “bio-musical,” is helping the network narrow the audience gap with longtime leader Univision on weeknights at 8 p.m.

Celia, the biographical novela about the Cuban salsa superstar Celia Cruz, has averaged some 771,000 viewers age 18-49 on weeknights at 8 p.m. during its premiere week of Oct. 12-18, up from Reina de Corazones’s 404,000 viewers in that timeslot a year ago, according to Nielsen estimates. 

Thus, Telemundo now trails Univision by “only” 86,000 viewers in the key advertiser demographic at 8 p.m. A year ago, the gap between Telemundo and first-place Univision was 1.5 million viewers.

For the week ending Oct. 25, Celia was the No. 9 among viewers 2-plus, attracting an average audnience of 1.71 milliom viewers. That’s slightly fewer viewers than Señora Acero, Telemundo’s 10 p.m. “Super Series” telenovela, and slightly less than the 7 p.m. edition of its popular courtroom show Caso Cerrado.

Celia airs opposite Univision’s Antes Muerto que Lichita, a Mexican telenovela produced by Rosy Ocampo for Televisa. The series stars actress and singer Maite Perroni with a theme song sung by veteran Latin pop singer Thalía.

According to Nielsen, Perroni’s telenovela attracted an average 2.03 million viewers aged 2-plus. Considering Perroni’s pull among key Hispanic millennial audiences, Celia will be a bonafide smash if the ratings success continues.

Celia is a first for Spanish-language broadcast television, as it borrows from the success of English-language primetime soaps Empire and Glee by injecting musical performances into the storyline.

Portraying Cruz in her younger years is Jeimy Osorio; newcomer Aymee Nuviola has been cast the older Cruz. Contemporary salsa music star La India is contributing to the show’s soundtrack.

In other Telemundo news, the post-Sábado Gigante war for Saturday-night viewers is on, as the Nov. 7 premiere of ¡Qué Noche! con Angelica y Raul attracted 538,000 adults aged 18-49. By comparison, Sabadazo — Univision’s successor to the long-running Sábado Gigante — attracted some 465,000 adults aged 18-49.

¡Qué Noche! is hosted by veteran telenovela actress Angelica Vale and Raul Gonzalez, who left Univision in March 2014 after a 12-year tenure as a co-anchor on Despierta América, the network’s morning show.

If preliminary expectations and PR hype are accurate gauges of how a new addition to the fall primetime lineup will fare with viewers, Telemundo executives today are likely shouting “¡azuuuuuucar!”

That’s the sugar-filled Spanish-language shout that helped cement Celia Cruz as the global “Queen of Salsa.” Celia, the new telenovela adaptation of the salsa icon’s life, is expected to be the network’s queen of the 8 p.m. timeslot.

Celia is a first for Spanish-language broadcast television, as it borrows from the success of English-language primetime series Empire and Glee by injecting musical performances into the storyline.

Portraying Cruz in her younger years (in her acting debut) is Jeimy Osorio; Aymee Nuviola has been cast as the older Cruz. A contemporary salsa music star, La India, is contributing to the show’s soundtrack.

Meanwhile, in a first for Telemundo, the first three episodes of Celia were made available via video-on-demand ahead of the network premiere. Celia is a Fox Telecolombia production.

To help promote Celia, a special tribute to Celia Cruz was incorporated into the inaugural Latin American Music Awards, which aired as a live telecast Oct. 8 on Telemundo as its proprietary answer to rival Univision’s long-running Premio lo Nuestro a la Música Latina. The segment featured Osorio alongside co-star Modesto Lacen, with a medley of the songstress’ greatest hits performed by Nuviola and La India.

The Latin American Music Awards mirrors the long-running American Music Awards and is also produced by Dick Clark Productions.