USA Greenlights Two New Originals

LOS ANGELES: Expanding its "Characters Welcome" brand, USA Network has announced the pickup of two new scripted originals: A Legal Mind and Necessary Roughness.

The two shows will premiere with 90-minute episodes, followed by 11 one-hour episodes. A Legal Mind stars Patrick J. Adams, Gabriel Macht, Meghan Markle, Gina Torres  and Rick Hoffman. It is about a brilliant but unmotivated college dropout who is hired by a top corporate lawyer. Necessary Roughness, with Callie Thorne, Marc Blucas, Mehcad Brooks and Scott Cohen, is from Sony Pictures Television and Universal Cable Productions. It is about a sexy divorcee who becomes a therapist for a professional football team.

"At USA, we like to say that the quality of the material advances the projects—and these are two great pilots!" said Jeff Wachtel, president of original programming at USA and co-head of original content at Universal Cable Productions. "A Legal Mind and Necessary Roughness take our original series to a new level, while honoring the character brand filter that has been so crucial to our success."