Wish fulfilled Vince and his Entourage riding high this season

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This article was published 23/07/2009 (6103 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

There’s no denying that pop-culture-obsessed North Americans love to see their celebrities crash and burn.

From Jon and Kate’s marital meltdown and Michael Jackson’s mysterious death to Alec Baldwin’s abusive voicemail messages and Michael Richards’ racist comedy-club rant, there seems to be no limit to the lengths trash-TV producers and consumers will go to get their daily falling-star fix.

But when it comes to Hollywood stars of the fictional variety, sometimes it’s more fun to share in success than point fingers at failure.

Take, for instance, the inside-showbiz HBO comedy/drama Entourage, which recently launched its sixth season (Sundays at 11:30 p.m., HBO Canada). After a fifth campaign that focused mostly on a painful dry spell in fictional movie star Vincent Chase’s (Adrian Grenier) career — a season that most fans would surely agree was pretty much a 13-episode downer — this new set of episodes finds Vince back on top, having landed the lead in a critically acclaimed new Martin Scorsese project. And when things are going well for Vince, life’s bound to be equally beautiful for his omnipresent posse of pals — manager Eric (Kevin Connolly), lesser-star brother Drama (Kevin Dillon) and self-appointed chauffeur Turtle (Jerry Ferrara).

And that — as the first two instalments of Season 6 have clearly demonstrated — makes the whole Entourage experience a lot more fun to watch.

At its heart, Entourage is a story of wish fulfilment. Based not so loosely on the Tinseltown experiences of series producer Mark Wahlberg and the back-home Boston boys he brought along to help him enjoy the wild ride to stardom, this is a show that feels best when the titular quartet is overcoming fairly minor Hollywood hurdles and operating in an only slightly fictional realm that gives viewers an inside glimpse at the workings of the dream factory.

It’s testament to Entourage‘s authenticity that so many real-life Hollywood types — from James Woods and James Cameron to Mandy Moore, Scorsese, Jay Leno and Jamie-Lynn Sigler (whose role as Turtle’s girlfriend is expanding this season) — have been so eager to sign on to play versions of themselves in the show.

As kind as it is to its fictional stars and real-life guests, Entourage is ruthless — some would say ruthlessly accurate — in its depiction of what goes on in Hollywood’s backrooms and boardrooms. Vince’s alpha-male super-agent, Ari Gold (Emmy winner Jeremy Piven), continues this season to be a hyper-agitated, conquest-obsessed, profanity-spewing bundle of personality quirks that most insiders agree are fairly borrowed from a number of actual high-profile star handlers.

Entourage runs best when Vince and the boys focus on the good life and Ari’s in charge of acting out anxieties.

In a 2006 interview, executive producer Doug Ellin agreed that the show risks losing a large chunk of its fan base if it makes Vince spend too much time in Hollywood’s darker corners.

"It’s not likely that we’re going to find Vince living on the streets or broke," Ellin said during that year’s version of the U.S. networks’ summer press tour. "At the end of the day, there is a lot of wish fulfilment to it, and since they have such a core group of friends that take care of each other, I think (viewers) will stay with them because it’s a fun ride."

brad.oswald@freepress.mb.ca

 

 

Top TV shows

1. So You Think You Can Dance 5 (CTV, Wednesday) — 1,656,000

2. So You Think You Can Dance 5 (CTV, Thursday) — 1,303,000

3. The Mentalist (CTV) — 1,259,000

4. C.S.I. Miami (CTV) — 1,213,000

5. Law and Order: CI (CTV) — 1,175,000

6. C.S.I. New York (CTV) — 1,151,000

7. NCIS (Global) — 1,093,000

8. CTV Evening News (CTV, Monday-Friday) — 1,079,000

9. Wipeout (Global) — 1,073,000

10. Big Brother 11 (Global) — 1,070,000

 

— BBM Nielsen Media Research, week of July 6