An edited-down version of the Monarchy: The Royal Family at Work documentary was a huge success on US TV on Monday night.

RDF made a two-hour show of the original five episode series for ABC's long-running current affairs strand 20/20. It attracted an impressive 14.2m viewers and beat the final episode of Fox's high profile Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles.

The Royals show aired from 8-10pm and earned 20/20 its largest audience in five years. Two back-to-back episodes of Chronicles, at the same time, drew 7.7m then 8.2m.

An RDF crew followed the Queen and other royals for more than a year to make the original BBC One series. The show became controversial when the BBC played a trailer to journalists and buyers that appeared to show the Queen storm out of a photo shoot.

It led to BBC One controller Peter Fincham and head of press Jane Fletcher resigning from the broadcaster.