Australia’s Got Talent finale pulls 908,000

Last night’s finale of Nine Network’s Australia’s Got Talent pulled a peak of 908,000 viewers in the five capital cities, according to overnight preliminary figures from OzTAM.

This was when Fletcher Pilon, 14-year-old singer/songwriter from Wamberal on the NSW Central Coast, was crowned winner.

The rest of the show was watched by 761,000 metro viewers, and it was the sixth highest rating show of the night.

Pilon’s emotional performance of Infinite Child, about his 10-year-old brother Banjo who died after being hit by a car last year, drew the greatest amount of public votes from five other finalists to win the $250,000 prize.

Pilon had already caught the attention of US singer Nicki Minaj who posted about him to her 42 million Facebook followers last month.

“This is beyond a big moment,” he said afterwards. Part of the prize would fund a surfing holiday with his father.

Pilon has been performing at pubs and weekend markets since he was 11. Cody Simpson had already chosen him to open on an upcoming national tour before last night’s win.

There is no word if Australia’s Got Talent will return in 2017. It was aired on Seven for six seasons before being dumped. Nine then picked it up, and then axed it in 2014 for poor ratings. Last year it announced it would resuscitate it for 2016. This year viewing figures fluctuated between 574,000 and 736,000 in the five metro cities.