Wilhelmina Slater

Wilhelmina Slater is the creative director of Mode magazine, and by rights the editor-in-chief's chair should be hers. She has the taste, the ambition, and the ruthlessness to run it. Instead she's watched the job hand itself to family favorites, and she is done waiting politely for what she's earned.

Vanessa Williams plays her with total conviction — every scheme is delivered with the same regal poise as every compliment, so you're never quite sure which is which. The writing gives her real hunger underneath the camp, and Williams makes Wilhelmina's ambition feel earned rather than cartoonish, even at its most delicious.