Access Hollywood Scores with Obama Family Interview

Sen. Barack Obama (D-Ill.) may have regretted letting his two daughters appear with his wife and him in an exclusive interview with Access Hollywood. But the syndicated entertainment newsmagazine from NBC Universal Domestic Television Distribution isn’t complaining.

For the week of July 7, when the interview ran, Access was up significantly from the previous week, averaging a 2.0 household rating for a 25% jump, according to Nielsen Media Research data. The program averaged 2.7 million total viewers, an increase of 20% over the previous week, and a 1.3 rating among women 25-54, for a week-to-week increase of 30%.

AccessHollywood.com saw an influx of traffic, more than 700,000 unique visitors, and the site hosted more than 1 million streams of the interview clips -- a 387% jump over the previous week.

"Obviously, the American viewing audience could not get enough of the Obama family together in their very first television interview," executive producer Rob Silverstein said in a statement. "The fascination with the Obama children was clearly reflected with our strong ratings."