'Good Life' means bad times for ITV

ITV has dropped a reality show recreating The Good Life after it became the latest in a series of high-profile flops for the channel.

Following a poor performance on Tuesday, ITV has pulled The Real Good Life from its peak-time schedule. The show, which has been running for just two weeks on ITV1 in the prime- time 8pm slot, followed three families as they left the rat-race to emulate Tom and Barbara Good's efforts to live off the land. Only 2.7million viewers tuned in to last week's launch and when viewing figures fell to 2.3m this week, Nigel Pickard, ITV's director of programmes, decided to drop the show from the weeknight schedule before the end of its planned seven-week run. A second show, Fat Families, which immediately followed The Real Good Life at 8.30pm, has also been axed.

The show, which features three overweight families trying to lose weight, was pulled after one episode in which it scraped an average audience of 2.1 million.

Mr Pickard is under intense pressure to turn the channel around after a series of flops in its 50th anniversary year.

Last month, ITV dropped Celebrity Wrestling from its key Saturday night schedule, while Celebrity Love Island has been widely panned by critics.

An ITV spokeswoman said ITV1 was still the most-watched channel in peak hours and had launched two new successful shows.

"We won the week across peak hours and successfully launched two new series, Ladette to Lady and Holiday Showdown," the spokeswoman said.