Fox certainly had a peachy keen Sunday night, with its live musical event Grease Live shattering all critical and audience expectations and positively taking over social media during the show’s airing across both coasts.

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From 7 to 10 p.m. last night, Fox ranked number one in adults 18-49, number one in adults 18-34, number one in total viewers, and number one among Teens. The network demolished its combined broadcast competition last night by 48% in adults 18-49 (4.3 vs. 2.9 for ABC/CBS/NBC).

No matter how you look at it, the ratings look like a beautiful blond pineapple. Grease Live scored a 4.3/13 in same-day ratings, up 26% from NBC’s The Wiz Live and 79% from Peter Pan Live, in Adults 18-49.

The show was up 6% (12.2 mil vs 11.5 mil) from The Wiz Live and up 32% from Peter Pan Live in total viewers (12.2 million vs 9.2 million).

The show proved to draw young folk like greased lightning to their TV screens, which in turn is like catnip for advertisers.

Grease Live was up 48% in adults 18-34 and up 68% in teens compared to The Wiz Live and up 85% in adults 18-34 and +131%, respectively, vs. Peter Pan Live.

In both adults 18-34 and teens, Grease Live drew a 3.7 rating. Grease Live out-rated NBC’s The Sound of Music by 23% among teens (numbers provided by Fox in an official statement).

The entire show, as well as highlights, is now available on FoxNow’s On Demand platform. Fox projects a 5.2 18-49 Live + 3 Day, and a 5.4 Live + 7 Day, with a total platform audience of 15.5 million (+27% vs. L+SD).

It was impossible to avoid Grease buzz on Twitter (@GoGrease). According to Fox, 358,500 people sent 1.2 million tweets about Grease Live during the show and those tweets were seen 162.2 million times, trending for thirteen hours from 11 AM until 1 AM PT the next day.

The internet truly exploded for the show’s high watermark moment, at 8:31 pm ET, with 9,350 tweets after Boyz II Men showed up to sing “Beauty School Dropout.”

According to Nielsen (reported via Fox), Grease Live is the #1 most viral Special Live Musical Event ever, beating out NBC’s triumvirate of Wiz Live, Sound of Music Live and Peter Pan Live, thanks to its higher number of unique authors, unique audience and impressions.

Fox was similarly active on Facebook, with 2.1 million plus views of 13 backstage live Facebook videos, hosted by Mario Lopez and Ellen’s Jeannie Klisiewicz.

Perhaps the buzziest use of social media came when stars Vanessa Hudgens, Carlos PenaVega and later Keke Palmer live-snapped DURING the show. This helped net 2 million views on yesterday’s story thus far, proving the social network’s viability for broadcast TV.

The network continued its partnership with the gif-maker site Giphy, creating shareable gif’s throughout the telecast.

The fun doesn’t stop, with the event’s soundtrack now available to stream.

The Grease Live soundtrack is already the best-selling musical on Amazon, ranking sixth overall in Movies & TV on Amazon.

The soundtrack led iTunes’ soundtrack genre on iTunes even before it aired on the East Coast, and it’s still leading the pack this morning.

After the West Coast airing of the event, the album was ranked in iTunes’ top-five albums overall, regardless of genre, with all 16 individual tracks making their way in iTunes’ top 100.

Grease is STILL the word on Twitter and beyond, with reviews and reactions universally glowing, and the network receiving high marks for its tasteful handing of the passing of star Hudgens’ father, and Vanessa Hudgens’ own fearless performance.

Brief Take: Grease Live is a huge win for Fox and for network TV, and proof that live musical event TV is here to stay. It’s the only realm that Netflix, Amazon and other streaming platforms can’t breach. Let the time warp begin.

[Cube image courtesy of Fox via Variety]

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