9 Women on Entourage Who Gave the Bros a Run for Their Money

Entourage premiered in 2004, just in time for Vinny Chase and the Chasers to push a wave of bro culture to its foamy peak. (If you’ve dated a guy who liked to pound Jager or “hug it out, b—” in the last decade, you can bet the HBO comedy had a hand in his persona.) Entourage was a fun, supremely watchable show about four friends, one short, frequently apoplectic agent, and about 300 naked women. We’re barely exaggerating here: IMDb credits dozens of actresses who appeared on the show with roles such as “Kissing Starlet,” “Woman in Bed,” and the ever-mysterious “Porn Star Driver.”

But Entourage—which makes the leap to the big screen this weekend—did have a small force of female characters with smart minds, smarter mouths, strong backbones, and shirts to cover them. These are the girls who kept the series from exceeding peak douchery.

Sasha Grey (Sasha Grey)

A former porn star playing a porn star might not seem like the most empowering thing on paper, but you had to respect Grey’s problematic character for not falling all over Vince like every other girl in the greater Los Angeles area seemed to. And frankly, I also had to cheer for her bold lack of grooming in the bikini line department. On Entourage, each visible pubic hair is its own tiny feminist revolution.

Sarah Silverman (Sarah Silverman)

When the show was just a baby—episode three!—Vince was a guest on Jimmy Kimmel Live! Silverman, playing herself, delivered this shot at Ari: “[You’re] so scumbaggy. I know you’re married. I take Krav Maga with your wife.” But the memorably faithful Ari was just trying to sign her. (Silverman and Kimmel were dating in real life at the time.)

Lizzie Grant (Autumn Reeser)

Grant was that friend we all have who’s a shark professionally and a mess personally. As a junior agent and Ari protege, she radiated former-class-president potential—but she screwed up and had a messy affair with the wonderfully wacky Andrew Daniels. (He was played by Gary Cole, meaning that Autumn Reeser and Christine Baranski have an on-screen love interest in common. Despite my age-gap watchdogging, I’m oddly fine with this.)

Amanda Daniels (Carla Gugino)

Gugino’s Amanda, who briefly snatched Vince from Ari in season three, was equal parts superagent and seductress. Well, maybe 60/40 in favor of superagent. What we loved about her—besides her calm takedown of Ari in front of the NFL—was that she was always business first. Amanda fans sucked in their breath nervously when she caved and got involved with Vince, but business always came first in their relationship, and she never became one of his sniffling dumpees.

Babs (Beverly D’Angelo)

Partner Babs was a frequent target of Ari’s most unprintable one-liners, and in a perfect PC world, she would have crushed him with a sexual-harassment lawsuit. But I loved the way she’d brush him off without blinking and just keep stomping around the agency like it was a high school she’d been teaching at for 64 years.

Sloan (Emmanuelle Chriqui)

Despite the scores of conquests presented in full-frontal glory, ask any male Entourage fan who their favorite girl on the show was; I guarantee they’ll tell you Sloane. She was the show’s ultimate quality girl, the moral center of a universe in which characters went back on their word three times before breakfast. Most important, she kept E from being mind-blowingly boring.

Shauna (Debi Mazar)

As Vince’s publicist, Mazar done did what Mazar does best: Walking ‘n’ talking, refusing to take no for an answer, and reminding us that angular black and white is the fashion aesthetic we should all aspire to.

Melissa Gold (Perry Reeves)

Reeves’ character, a model of dignity and patience, was informally known as Mrs. Ari until the very end of the series, when Ari tearfully pled for her to take him back and called her by her name. The series desperately needed her for the same reason Ari did: She has zero tolerance for B.S.

Dana Gordon or, as I prefer to call her, Dana Muthaf—ing Gordon (Constance Zimmer)

If you think about it, Dana Gordon had a more fully told story over the course of Entourage than Vince. (I mean, Alice Eve comes out of nowhere with some strangely timed Vanity Fair assignment, and two minutes later they’re eloping in Paris? Not quite earned!) But Dana’s career drama was fully drawn and her last-minute relationship with Ari (and subsequent hope for a baby) actually tugged at the heartstrings. By the end of the show, the only people I cared about were her, Ari, and Melissa. Her real legacy, though, is as a female character whose C-suite status was a given from day one—and whose professional wins and losses, even enveloped in the wonky inside baseball of the Hollywood machine, made for hugely exciting TV. In my mind, she paved the way for Alicia Florrick on The Good Wife by prepping us to find the drama in high-level industry shufflings.