2.9m see Tennant's 'Buzzcocks' special

A Doctor Who-themed edition of Buzzcocks performed well for BBC Two last night, early viewing figures show.

The half-hour special, which was hosted by David Tennant, pulled in 2.93m (14%) between 10pm and 10.30pm, easily beating last week's performance of 2.08m (10.8%).

Earlier on BBC Two, Grow Your Own Drugs For Christmas logged 1.61m (6.8%) at 8pm, then 2.32m (9.4%) watched The Hairy Bikers' Twelve Days Of Christmas at 9pm.

Over on BBC One, Waterloo Road and Spooks put in 3.75m (15.8%) and 3.99m (16.2%) at 8pm and 9pm respectively.

The latest instalment of Jamie's Family Christmas had 2.01m (8.7%) for Channel 4 at 8pm, then 1.38m (5.7%) tuned in for the 8.30pm screening of Come Dine With Me Extra Portions. The Family managed 1.48m (6%) during the 9pm hour, and 900k (5.3%) chose the penultimate episode of True Blood at 10pm.

Five's Britain's Best Brain bowed out to 323k (1.4%) at 8pm, then the audience climbed to 660k (2.7%) during the 9pm screening of The Exorcist: The True Story. The film itself followed, averaging 511k (4.2%) between 10pm and 12.40am.

ITV1's coverage of The Royal Variety Performance grabbed an impressive 8.81m (37.4%) between 7.30pm and 10pm.

Overall, ITV1 dominated primetime with an average share of 32.7% to BBC One's 17.6%. BBC Two was third with 8.6%, followed by Channel 4 with 5.6% (+1: 0.7%) and Five's 2.3%.

BARB ratings data supplied by Attentional