USA adds ‘Roughness’ to escapist lineup

The summer season has been kind to the USA Network, offering large audiences for its easy, breezy escapist series such as “Royal Pains” (8 p.m.), entering its third season tonight.

USA shows rarely worry about plausibility and offer fun, distracting fantasies about attractive professionals who turn the lemons of personal or career setbacks into a gilded lemonade stand of second chances. In USA’s new offering, “Necessary Roughness” (9 p.m.), therapist Dani Santino (Callie Thorne) moves from discovering her husband’s infidelity to having heavy rebound sex with a stranger, all within about six weeks. That’s about five minutes in TV pilot time. Her handsome new beau lands her the job of a lifetime, counseling a troubled NFL wide receiver (Mehcad Brooks). That allows Dani, a feisty Long Island mother, to interact with a gridiron egomaniac while making an undreamed-of NFL salary. Her two frisky teens and her husband’s nasty divorce lawyer keep Dani grounded. There’s also her gambling-addicted, live-in mother to keep things interesting.

Add “Roughness” to the growing pile of USA offerings that keep the “lite” in light comedy.

• You don’t have to be a professional TV watcher to see that “Love in the Wild” (9 p.m., NBC) is little more than “The Bachelor” crossed with “Amazing Race” with a little “Survivor” thrown in.

Like every far-flung reality adventure series, “Wild” includes a musical score as familiar as it is ear-bludgeoning. The makers of the show have clearly scoured the globe to find a sufficiently loud and excitable host and have come up with Darren McMullen, best known (to those who know him at all) for hosting Australia’s version of “Minute To Win It.”

In every episode, couples will pair up, “Amazing Race”-style, to compete in feats of derring-do. But they’re also coupled off for other reasons (wink, wink). During each episode’s elimination process, players can announce whether they want to stay together or team up with other players. The process leaves some dangling singly at the end, like a game of musical chairs. At the conclusion of every episode, two unattached players will be sent home, haunted by the knowledge that not only are they unloved, but also that they’ve blabbed and blubbered about it on national television.

• “Clean House” (8 p.m., Style) reveals the nation’s messiest home.

• A professional illusionist travels to a far-off land where magic is treated with a grim respect in the one- hour special “The Supernaturalist” (9 p.m., Discovery).

Tonight’s other highlights

• Cat Deeley hosts a two-hour version of “So You Think You Can Dance” (7 p.m., Fox).

• A first dance brings anxiety on “Modern Family” (8 p.m., ABC).

• “MythBusters” (8 p.m., Discovery) compares paper armor to steel.

• Scheduled on “Primetime” (9 p.m., ABC): twins and their secrets.

• The car dealership needs a TV spot on “Men of a Certain Age” (9 p.m., TNT).

• “Behind the Music” (9 p.m., VH1) profiles Missy Elliott.