Hank Rearden
John Galt is the über-capitalist in Ayn Rand’s novel Atlas Shrugged, but steel magnate Rearden is easier to take.
Milo Minderbinder
Other Catch-22 characters see war as hell. But in the classic Joseph Heller novel, Minderbinder sees war as a hell of an opportunity.
Daniel Plainview
The oil tycoon in There Will Be Blood, as portrayed by Daniel Day Lewis. Is that milk-shake speech being taught in b-schools yet?
Jerry Maguire
He’s got one employee and one client. He had better make them love him.
Mildred Pierce
Played by Joan Crawford, the heroine of this namesake film builds a restaurant chain so she can give her daughter everything. The hospitality industry treats her well. The daughter doesn’t.
Willy Wonka
The entrepreneur as magician. Seriously, is there a company you would rather own?
Homer Simpson
He has been a snowplow entrepreneur, sugar tycoon, Internet consultant, grease recycler, tabloid publisher, bar owner, bounty hunter, talent manager, and on and on. All without quitting his day job.
Charles Foster Kane
Orson Welles’s great tragic character gains the world but loses his soul.
Tony Stark
Bruce Wayne is also a self-made industrialist. But Iron Man’s alter ego has stronger R&D cred.
Harold Hooper
The genial Hooper establishes Sesame Street’s general store as a pillar of diversity—and succession planning. Jewish himself, he leaves the business to his African-American assistant.
Maxine Lund
When this character in Being John Malkovich (played by Catherine Keener) discovers that the business at which she works is a portal into the movie star’s brain, she starts calculating how much she can charge for tickets.
Stringer Bell
The Wire’s pusher-cum-real-estate-developer attends business school and instructs his corner boys in marketing theory.
Fred and George Weasley
You can’t fail when Harry Potter spots you seed capital.
Bree Van de Kamp
Played by Marcia Cross, Desperate Housewives’s domestic goddess goes from catering start-up to emerging national brand.
Rick Blaine
Is there a more elegant embodiment of international entrepreneurship than Casablanca’s expatriate café owner? Or a finer reminder that some things are bigger than business?
Lorelai Gilmore and Sookie St. James
Stars Hollow, the setting for Gilmore Girls, is the most small-business-friendly town in America. Its heart is the Dragonfly Inn, creatively managed by these voluble neophytes.
The Once-ler
This Dr. Seuss villain is well named. Once, it was easy to despoil the environment in pursuit of riches. Now, corner offices abound with self-proclaimed Loraxes.
Seymour “Swede” Levov
The hero of Philip Roth’s American Pastoral is the epitome of a virtuous second-generation business owner—a disciplined, one-time high school athlete from Newark, New Jersey. Alas, the ’60s were not kind to capitalists—or to Newark, New Jersey.
Bill Henrickson
The paterfamilias of HBO’s Big Love has two stores and three wives. Work-life balance is a challenge.
Sweeney Todd and Mrs. Lovett
Upstairs, he cuts hair and throats. Downstairs, she bakes the corpses into pies. They collect revenue at both ends.
George Jefferson
He is forever movin’ on up, leaving his non-self-employed former neighbor, Archie Bunker, in the dust.
Calvin Palmer
The hero of Barbershop, played by Ice Cube, thinks the family business is a pain in the neck. Then he learns to love his clients and employees. Too late! He has already sold it. A cautionary tale for all business owners who like to fantasize about moving on.
Benjamin Horne
Location, location, location. Twin Peaks’s major business owner (played by Richard Beymer) knows the downside of setting up shop in a creepy mystical vortex.
Yermolay Lopakhin
The change agent in Chekov’s The Cherry Orchard. A shame about those trees, though.
Frenchy
In Woody Allen’s Small Time Crooks, this Tracey Ullman character opens a cookie store to provide cover while her husband tunnels into the bank next door. Turns out there’s more dough to be made in dough.
Peter Venkman, Raymond Stantz, and Egon Spengler
The most implausible aspect of the Ghostbusters’ business model? They never patent those proton packs.
Paul Dombey
On issues of succession, Dickens’s doomed shipping magnate could learn a lot from Hugh Hefner. The book should have been Dombey and Daughter!
Forrest Gump
To succeed in business, you need smarts and luck. Or at least one of them.
Julia Sugarbaker
In the ’80s, Republicans had Dallas and Dynasty. Democrats had Designing Women, and Dixie Carter, who portrayed the caustic and spirited managing partner of as Atlanta interior decoration firm.
Tony Soprano
We know; you’re offended by the comparison. But Tony is the master of getting to yes.
