Fox News’ Ratings Surprise: ‘The Five’ Keeps Outperforming Primetime

variety.com:

Brian Steinberg Senior TV EditorEveryone’s talking about this week’s furor at the Oscars — even the hosts at Fox News Channel’s “The Five.”On Monday afternoon, regulars Greg Gutfeld, Dana Perino, Jesse Watters and Jeanine Pirro held forth with guest Piers Morgan — the British journalist and TV host who has demonstrated a proclivity for getting into celebrity feuds — sitting in a chair typically reserved for someone with more liberal political views.

In the show’s opening segment, however, politics went out the window. Today was a day to discuss Will Smith’s slapping of Chris Rock the previous evening.Pirro, a former judge and district attorney, felt Smith’s actions were prosecutable.

The Oscar ceremony “is not a bar” where fights take place, she said, noting that if the actor wasn’t reprimanded in some fashion, “I should go over to ‘Saturday Night Live,’” where she is often lampooned, “and go crazy over there.” Meanwhile, Gutfeld took the whole incident in stride. “Part of me was just grateful something interesting happened” at the event, which has been shedding viewers noticeably over the years.

The aforementioned banter may seem a little silly, but it’s no laughing matter for executives at Fox News Channel.The most-watched program at the Fox Corp.