No Secret: USA Cancels 'Covert Affairs'

Looks like Christopher Gorham’s Auggie Anderson character didn’t have to make the decision to leave the agency after all: USA Network made it for him.

After a five-season run, USA elected not to renew Covert Affairs, from corporate cousin Universal Cable Productions, for a sixth campaign.  As it stands, the Dec. 18 episode in which Anderson was deciding whether to leave the CIA and Piper Perabo’s Annie Walker was weighing a marriage proposal and an offer to join a different CIA taskforce, was the show’s last, attracting 1.6 million watchers.

The show joinsWhite Collar, which concluded its six-season stay at USA last year, and Rush, which lasted just one, on the sidelines.

During its fifth season, Covert Affairs averaged 990,000 18-to-49 viewers in Nielsen live+seven ratings — a 136% increase from its live-plus-same day numbers. The series averaged 1.3 million 25-to-54 viewers gauged on a live+seven  basis, up 141% from live-plus-same day, and 3.3 million total viewers, a 117% advance.

Those deliveries evidently weren’t good enough to go forward. The cable network, which ceded its perch atop cable primetime to ESPN in 2014, has renewed a number of series, including Royal Pains, Suits, Graceland, Satisfaction, Playing House and Chrisley Knows Best. On tap for 2015:  Dig, Mr. Robot and Complications.

The network also has four pilots in the works.