The Gorgeous Ladies of Wrestling
A list of the characters in GLOW, including the main ensemble and the supporting cast. Beware of unmarked spoilers.
open/close all folders
Gorgeous Ladies of Wrestling
General
- Amazonian Beauty: A lot of the female wrestlers are would-be actresses who've been told time and again they're not beautiful enough for film. They're stunned to realize how many men find their costumes and wrestling personas sexy. Even Tamme (a heavy-set, middle-aged mom) and Sheila (who's been called weird and ugly all her life) win their share of sincere admirers.
Ruth
Ruth Wilder
Ruth as "Zoya the Destroya"
Gimmick: Zoya the Destroya
Portrayed By: Alison Brie
The main protagonist of GLOW also happens to be the main heel of the show. Ruth is a struggling actress who finds new life in the role of Soviet caricature Zoya.
- Agony of the Feet: Debbie takes cocaine before a match and in her addled state, she ends up breaking Ruth's ankle for real.
- The Atoner: She puts up with a lot of poor treatment from Debbie out of guilt over sleeping with Debbie's husband. Though after Debbie breaks Ruth’s ankle in a moment of coked-up rage during a bout, she makes it clear that that's the final straw and she's done playing the martyr.
- Badass Adorable: When the girls swap gimmicks in Season 3’s “Freaky Tuesday” episode, Ruth plays Liberty Belle as a ridiculously chipper Judy Garland-inspired “sweet, innocent girl” from the Midwest.Ruth!Liberty Belle: THIS American toothpick runs on nothing but MEAT! And WHEAT from the great State of Nebraska! *drop-kicks Debbie!Zoya in the stomach*
- The Bad Guy Wins: Zoya ends up winning the GLOW crown at the in-universe Season 2 series finale.
- Brainy Brunette: Brown-haired and quick to learn the fundamentals of wrestling with her acting talent and knowledge. At the end of of Season One, she had planned a script for the Pilot when Sam goes AWOL.
- Dirty Communists: Her entire schtick is that of a cocky Soviet who "hates puny Americans".
- Endearingly Dorky: Is "Girl Next Door" cute, really dorky and has the earnest, struggling actress vibe down pat. Considering who she’s played by definitely helps.
- Evil Is Hammy: She takes a trip to the ham-yard when she's playing Zoya.
- Evil Twin: Zoya's the evil twin — her good twin, Olga, helps Liberty Belle rescue her daughter from Zoya. This role kept her in the show while her ankle healed.
- Expy: The character of Zoya the Destroya is based on Colonel Ninotchka from the original GLOW. Like Zoya, the character of Ninotchka poked fun at the on-going cold war between the Soviet Union and the United States and was frequently heard talking on the phone to a KGB spy named Vladimir and would promise to dominate the "puny Americans."
- Fake Russian: In-Universe, as Zoya the Destroya.
- Flyover Country: She's from Nebraska and has been compared to a "Farmer's Daughter". In Season 3's Freaky Tuesday episode, she takes up the Liberty Belle persona and she gives her a Midwestern flavor that sounds and looks like a cross between Judy Garland and Esther Williams. She even considers herself an expert on different steak cuts as she is from Omaha.
- Foreign Wrestling Heel: Zoya, who "eats stars and stripes for breakfast".
- Game-Breaking Injury: Debbie fractures her leg during a particularly intense match and she's sidelined for eight weeks. Ultimately they find a way to incorporate her into the last match of the series. This whole storyline is an Homage to when Susie Spirit broke her arm live in the ring on the original GLOW.
- The Generic Guy: In stark contrast to everyone else, Sam and Bash initially have a very hard time figuring out a workable persona for her.
- Go-Getter Girl: Always keen to get stuck in, do as good a job as she can, and orchestrate others to do the same. It doesn’t always work out for her of course, but her default approach is to fling herself at a given task with positivity.
- Innocently Insensitive: In a more low-key way than Stacey and Dawn, but Ruth can be insensitive or even offensive towards others without meaning to, often because she's assuming a familiarity or knowledge that she doesn't actually have. This is especially clear when she invites herself to the hotel manager's family gathering to learn more about Russians.
- Intergenerational Friendship: With Sam, who's around twenty years her senior.
- Hate Sink: The point of both her wrestling personas. Her initial "home-wrecker" character is heavily based on her actual conflict with Debbie, whereas Zoya represents everything Cold War America despises about the Soviet Union.
- No-Respect Guy: In Season one (especially) Ruth is something of a Butt-Monkey, with Sam constantly deriding her appearance in the most personal ways possible and the other girls treating her as an annoying know-it-all when she tries to get them to up their acting game. She gradually gains more respect and trust, but it takes a long while.
- Number Two: Ironically considering Sam hates her at first, she eventually falls into this role for him. He often consults with her about his decisions (while making it clear he in no way values her opinions) and she pretty much writes, directs, books and performs their first taped show due to his absence. By the end of Season 2, she is officially appointed as his co-director.
- Red Scare: Her gimmick incarnate, complete with red leotard with hammer and sickle motif and sometimes an ushanka fur hat.
- Soapbox Sadie: She is intelligent and creative, often lecturing the other girls about professionalism and taking things seriously, as well as railing against the expectations that society has for women like her.
- Sibling Murder: Zoya murders "good twin" Olga, while the latter gets her surgery for her deformed foot.
- Teeth-Clenched Teamwork: With Debbie, who loathes the sight of her during Season 1 and part way into Season 2, due to the fact that she slept with Debbie's husband.
- Waiting for a Break: She's an aspiring actress at the start of the series, which is occasionally played for laughs via her stereotypically earnest, "God I hope I get it!" personality.
- We Used to Be Friends: With Debbie. By the end of the first Season, they go from hatred to a tentative mutual support.
- What the Hell, Hero?: The series takes a brave gamble in introducing protagonist Ruth, who knowingly sleeps with her best friend Debbie’s husband midway through the pilot.
- Would Hurt a Child: Zoya kidnaps and is willing to kill Liberty Belle's daughter.
Debbie
Debbie Eagan
Debbie as "Liberty Belle"
Gimmick: Liberty Belle
Portrayed By: Betty Gilpin
A former soap-opera actress and friend of Ruth's, Debbie strives to be taken seriously as a producer while also playing the role of American heroine Liberty Belle.
- '80s Hair: Sports a huge pouffy perm as Liberty Belle, and in real-life she tends to pile her hair up in a big quiff.
- All-American Face: As Liberty Belle, complete with Stars and Stripes themed leotard.
- Alpha Bitch: Downplayed example. She doesn't go out of her way to insult anyone but she carries a vendetta against a very contrite Ruth and she doesn't interact with the other women that much. She also maintains a somewhat aloof sense of superiority, as opposed to someone like Tamme, for example, who takes time to chat with a drive-thru attendant about her children. During their fight in the seventh episode of the second season, Ruth also accuses Debbie of only wanting to be friends with her in the first place so that she could feel smug about having a more successful life than her.
- Bigger Is Betterin Bed: The wrestler Steel Horse is apparently very well endowed and very good in bed, if Debbie's condition the next morning is anything to go by. Downplayed as while she clearly enjoyed it, it reminded her of the difference between one night of fun, and a lover who knows you intimately. Debbie says that Steel Horse was so big that it might hurt the next time she pees.
- Blonde Republican Sex Kitten: Debbie has big blonde hair and plays Liberty Belle as an anti-communist, all-American hero whose own hero is Ronald Reagan.
- Career Versus Family: A big conflict in Season 3, as her work in Vegas takes her away from her baby boy Randy. She deals with another working mother (a flight attendant) giving her a hard time about it.
- Conditioned to Accept Horror: A more charitable interpretation of her complete lack of sympathy for Ruth almost being raped by a sleazy TV executive; as far as she's concerned, being forced to have sex with sleazy men to get a break is just part and parcel of being a woman working in TV and cinema during the 80s.
- The Cynic: Disaffected and disillusioned, her tone falls into aching sarcasm a lot of the time. Likely all driven by the fact that she was written out of the successful soap opera she was starring in, and the fact that her husband cheated on her — with sometime best friend Ruth.
- Deadpan Snarker: She has a dry sense of the ridiculous and isn't afraid to lampshade the ridiculousness of her cast-mates and fellow producers.
- Deuteragonist: While the main focus of the series is the development of GLOW, the show's secondary arc is Debbie's attempts to adapt to the world of wrestling (she didn't even intend to audition in the first place, and just happened to confront Ruth over the affair with her husband in the middle of it), as well as her recovery after discovering said affair.
- Disappeared Dad: Her mother reveals that Debbie's dad left after she was born, the closest thing to a father figure she has is her mother's boyfriend/second husband, Ron.
- Disproportionate Retribution: Played with; she has pretty valid reasons to be pissed off at Ruth, given that the latter had an affair with her husband, but the series gradually suggests that her marriage and life was far from perfect to begin with and her refusal to even consider letting go of some of her anger and spite towards Ruth is increasingly unreasonable, unfair and harmful not just to Ruth but to herself as well. Her breaking of Ruth's ankle during a bout in a moment of coked-up fury is definitely played as this, however, and her apparent lack of remorse afterwards is shown to be entirely unreasonable, leading to Ruth making it clear in no uncertain terms that whether Debbie forgives her or not, she's done taking shit from her.
- Eagleland: Her wrestling persona parodies Type 1 all the way.Liberty Belle : How do you spell "freedom" ? U - S - A!
- Everyone Loves Blondes: Discussed in-series; one of the reasons she's deemed perfect to play "all-American girl" Liberty Belle is because she has beautiful, thick blonde hair.
- Expy: The character of Liberty Belle is based primarily on Americana and to a lesser extent Babe the Farmer’s Daughter from the original GLOW, who represented "beauty, courage, strength, and pride" and frequently battled with the show's villains, including Spanish Red, Ninotchka, and Palestina.
- The Fashionista: Debbie has a seemingly limitless wardrobe, and both her day and evening-wear are absolutely on point for the 80s period, as is her curvaceous-yet-toned, wasp-waisted figure.
- Genre Savvy: In-Universe example. Her artistry as a wrestler finally takes off as soon as she realizes wrestling is basically a type of soap opera, which she knows how to do.
- Happy Holidays Dress: Wears a low-cut, off the shoulder gown in the GLOW Christmas show.
- Hates the Job, Loves the Limelight: GLOW isn't exactly Debbie's dream-job, but after leaving her husband and having been written off her steady soap-opera job, it's her way of staying in front of the camera.
- The Hero: Of the GLOW Faces.
- Housewife: After being written off her soap opera show, she becomes a stay-at-home mom.
- Interrupted Intimacy: Debbie is getting railed in missionary sex by Vegas hotel valet Chet in her room when he gets distracted by loud disco music. She tells him to ignore it, then he starts doing sex moves to the music which makes Debbie reply " Don't Fuck me to the Song!". Before she finally stops him.
- It's All About Me: Ruth accuses Debbie of this during their fight in episode seven of Season two, suggesting that she was only friends with Ruth in the first place to have someone to look down on, and of barging her way into the wrestling show partly in order to ensure that Ruth wouldn't have any success that might possibly overshadow Debbie's. It's implied she's not far off the truth.
- Large Ham: Liberty Belle is a hilariously over-the-top all-American hero, prone to perpetual smiling, bouts of hysterical patriotism, and maternally-outraged melodramatics.
- Mama Bear: In person, very loving and protective of her son Randy. As Liberty Belle, she's "a proud American Mother" who'd never imagine a world without freedom and is ready to kick any Soviets that threaten the freedom of her and her children.
- Nice Character, Mean Actor: "Liberty Belle" is a charming whirlwind of positivity and fun — Debbie....is not. She's not necessarily mean per se but definitely tends towards heavy cynicism, and exhibits a jaded world-view.
- Parents as People: She loves Randy but admits to Cherry that she sometimes wishes she never married and had a baby given how difficult it is to be a producer, wrestler, and a single mother.
- Patriotic Fervor: Liberty Belle incarnate, who’s the perfect hammy hero for Reagan-era 80s America.
- The Prima Donna: Is this when it comes to her character and when trying to find her a heel, to the point that Sam ends up neglecting the other women.
- Punny Name: Liberty Belle, playing off of bell/belle.
- Really Gets Around: In season 3 after divorcing her husband and while staying at the Las Vegas hotel Debbie begins having sex with various male staff. She mentions banging both valets (one of which we see her banging), the night bartender, a baccarat dealer, and even a juggler. She also hooks up with Steel Horse a famously hung wrestler in season 1 after seeing him perform while attending her first live wrestling show. And later sleeps with an old businessman named Tex in Season 3. In total along with her husband Debbie has sex with 8 people over 3 seasons.
- "The Reason You Suck" Speech: Will readily tear a strip off people who have offended her in a big way (Ruth, ex-husband Mark, Bash, a working-mom-shaming flight attendant).
- Sensual Slavs: When the girls swap gimmicks in Season 3’s “Freaky Tuesday” episode, Debbie plays Zoya in a far more sexually-charged manner, flirting with ring-announcer Bash and looking “to extract official secrets from him”, as well as provocatively shaking her ass for the crowd.
- Shower of Angst: She takes one after accidentally breaking's Ruth's ankle in a match.
- Signature Move: Liberty Belle’s signature move is a Diving Crossbody. She also frequently uses a Corner Foot Choke.
- So Beautiful, It's a Curse: She mostly got attention for her body as a teenager and it has influenced her Weight Woe practices.
- Soap Opera: Prior to GLOW she had a part on the popular (in-universe) soap, "Paradise Cove" (clearly an Expy of Knots Landing — even the opening credits are almost exactly the same), though her part was written out.
- Southern Belle: Debbie puts on a Southern accent as Liberty Belle to make the name a pun. It also makes her sound more wholesome.
- Stepford Smiler: Debbie and her Liberty Belle persona fit this trope.
- When she was married to Mark, she would make sure she appeared to others (especially Ruth) as a happily married housewife with a baby despite an Awful Wedded Life where she despises Mark and he has her Stay in the Kitchen.
- Liberty Belle is a stereotypical All-American Blonde Sweetheart with a constant smile on her face, even when she is grieving over her daughter being kidnapped. The "Don't Kidnap" music video had her constantly force a smile on her own face everytime she was about to cry about kidnappers.
- Sugar-and-Ice Personality: Debbie tends towards a cynical, dry default tone, but when she's with her son or when excited by a business idea, she's as sweet as pie.
- Teeth-Clenched Teamwork: With Ruth, though it takes her a long time to trust Ruth enough to work with her in the ring. As Steel Horse tells her, you don't have to like someone to wrestle well with them.
- X-Pac Heat: In universe, the crowd ends up turning on Liberty Belle after the "get a job" post match skit with Welfare Queen doesn't go over with the crowd as hoped. Fortunately, Ruth is able to salvage the situation by faking a kidnapping of a little girl in the crowd and passing her off as Liberty Belle's daughter.
- Weight Woe: Desert Pollen sees Debbie become insecure when a dance instructor makes a comment about her backside, which stirs up insecurities about her body and about her motherhood and she ends up making herself sick at the end of the episode. She notes she’s been dieting since age 14 because all people notice is her body.
Cherry
Cherry Bang
Cherry as "Black Magic"
Gimmick: Junkchain / Black Magic
Portrayed By: Sydelle Noel
Cherry is the most experienced fighter in the GLOW cast and has the unenviable task of trying to keep the ladies in shape.
- Action Girl: Before having to take over as the trainer for the girls, she's a trained stuntwoman. The first scene we see of her TV show is her chasing after a criminal.
- Career Versus Family: She enjoys her stunt and wrestling work and is working on starting a family but finds out that pregnancy can be gruelling with the combination of the physical work she does, even dangerous, and that it could set her career back.
- Deadpan Snarker: She often voices snark at Debbie's diva-like attitude, Sam's questionable practices, Melrose's wild behavior, and any other thing that seems ridiculous. She even snarks at herself for being serious.
- Dude, Where's My Respect?: Taken for granted by Sam, who just assumes she'll be fine with training the rest of the girls. The girls also have varying reactions to her - from Ruth and Carmen, who value her even as they gripe about the training, to Melrose, who is cruel and mocking to her.
- Expy: The character of Black Magic is based on Big Bad Momma from the original GLOW, a villainous character who used voodoo to cast spells to subdue her opponents in the ring.
- The Gambling Addict: In Season 3, She ends up $5,000 in debt to the casino playing craps.
- Happily Married: To Keith.
- Hollywood Voodoo: Her second gimmick is that of a voodoo priestess who uses her powers to control people.
- Loser Leaves Town: She fights against Yolanda for the right to be Junkchain. Subverted since only "Black Junkchain" leaves, which allows Cherry to take the role of Black Magic.
- My Biological Clock Is Ticking: Not a worry for her, but as she is in her late 20s or early 30s (given she has been working as a stunt double since The '70s), Keith confides that he wants to start having kids with her.
- Odd Friendship: With Debbie. They bond over (semi) quitting smoking, walks of shame, and just why they call a wrestler "Steel Horse".
- Only Sane Man: Amongst a group of variously dramatic, eccentric and just plain weird women, Cherry is often the voice of reason — especially when it comes to the girls keeping up a level of fitness required for the job.
- Sassy Black Woman: Takes no shit from Sam, or anyone else for that matter.
- Trapped by Gambling Debts: In Season 3, she ends up $5,000 in debt to the casino and resorts to mud wrestling to pay it off.
Carmen
Carmen Wade
Carmen as "Machu Picchu"
Gimmick: Machu Picchu
Portrayed By: Britney Young
Carmen comes from a family of wrestlers and was always overshadowed by her brothers, until she decided to make a name for herself in GLOW.
- Ambiguously Brown: When everyone switches characters for Season 3's "Freaky Tuesday" episode, she announces she's the only other one (apart from Cherry) who can play Welfare Queen due to being half-black, which comes as quite a surprise to the rest of the crew.
- The Artifact: In-universe, Machu-Picchu is her name in the ring when she's initially conceived of being a Wrestling Monster, depicted as a Mayincatec warrior. However her sweet nature and inability to act results in this being dropped and instead, Machu-Picchu is merely just Carmen playing herself.
- Badass Adorable: Her winsome countenance and easygoing nature make her a perfect "gentle giant"....that could take down fellow big-girl, Welfare Queen.
- Bad Liar: Her attempt at convincing her dad she's dating Bash folds like a house of cards after one look from him. She also provides some not-very-convincing comments during Debbie and Ruth's training session with her brothers.
- The Big Guy: The big girl, named after a mountain citadel.
- But Now I Must Go: At the end of season 3 Carmen informs Ruth and Debbie that she wants to work on the road like her brother.
- Expy: The character of Machu Picchu is based on Mount Fiji from the original GLOW, who like Carmen was the heart of the show and beloved by fans and her fellow cast members.
- Face: Undoubtedly one of the good guys in the GLOW cast, just like the wrestler she's based on.
- Gentle Giant: Her size initially gets her cast as a heel Wrestling Monster, but Bash quickly convinces her that her natural sweetness makes her better suited to a face.
- The Heart: Ruth outright calls her this when she organizes a wrestling play that everybody loved.
- Mayincatec: Her wrestling theme (maybe)
- The Mentor: She has easily the best knowledge of wrestling history and how wrestling personas should work, and schools the other girls, who are all far less experienced than she is.
- Odd Friendship: With Bash. He pretends to be her boyfriend after knowing her for five minutes, helps her after her panic attack, and confides in her about his money/parental problems.
- When Bash steals Britannica for his bride, Carmen's face falls in the background. She doesn't realize Bash wants a wife to hide that he's gay.
- Parental Abandonment: Her mother left for unknown reasons.
- Performance Anxiety: At the first live show, she has a panic attack before getting into the ring and runs out of the gym, nearly having a heart attack.
- Raised by Dudes: Lives with her dad and two older brothers — all wrestlers. Seems to have the opposite personality to all of them.
- Shout-Out: When she dresses up as the Ghost of Christmas Future for the holiday special, her style and moveset almost echoes The Undertaker. Her finisher at the end of the match almost looked like she was setting up for the Last Ride.
- Signature Move: Machu’s signature moves are a Powerbomb and Avalanche Splash.
- Wrestling Family: She's from one of these, allowing her to teach the girls a fair bit about wrestling, though her father disapproves of her being in the ring. He comes around in the season 1 finale though, leading the "Machu! Machu!" cheers.
Justine
Justine Biagi
Justine as "Scab"
Gimmick: Scab
Portrayed By: Britt Baron
A 17-year-old punk rock girl who uses the in-ring name "Scab". She is a fan of Sam's exploitation films and has a romantic relationship with pizza boy Billy Offal.
- Badass Adorable: "Scab" may be brash, loud and fierce, but her clothes, hairstyle and petite frame means she looks pretty cute, too. Especially if you're into punk girls.
- Bratty Teenage Daughter: She’s a classic moody, emo-ish teen with a snarky reply always at the ready.
- Deadpan Snarker: Very much so — her default tone is fatigued sarcasm.
- Demoted to Extra: In-universe, the Scab gimmick is discarded after the crew learns that she's a minor, but she still helps the show out in Season 2 by appearing as a variety of bit characters.
- Easily Forgiven: Even though she tried to frame Rhonda for the theft of Sam's camera and get her fired, Rhonda didn't hold it against her and even convinced Sam not to fire her.
- Everyone Is Jesus in Purgatory: She has some unconventional ways of interpreting Sam's cinematic portfolio.
- Fangirl: She is this for horror movies and especially for Sam's films, gushing to him about his script for "The Wrath of Kuntar". Averted for wrestling itself — she doesn't really want to wrestle so much as she just wants to reconnect with her father.
- Generation Xerox: Her father, Sam, and her are pretty similar, being heavily into gory horror, both being opinionated and quick to anger, Sir Swears-a-Lot, and both being AV Club geeks. He's pretty happy when he realises the extent of this.
- Heel: Her character, "Scab" — a punkish hooligan designed to piss off conservative 80s audiences.
- Karma Houdini: Tried to frame Rhonda for the theft of Sam's camera and suffers no recourse for it.
- Luke, You Are My Father: "The Liberal Chokehold" reveals that she's Sam's illegitimate daughter.
- Spoiled by the Format: Long before the eventual reveal of her age and parentage, the viewer is likely to catch on that 'Scab' won't make it into the ring because unlike the others she's never seen building a match relationship with a partner.
- The Quincy Punk: Her wrestling persona is this, one that is seen as threatening to Yuppies and Middle America. While she's a legitimate punk music fan, she's much more mild-mannered and quieter than this persona out of the ring.
Rhonda
Rhonda Richardson (later Howard)
Rhonda as "Britannica"
Gimmick: Britannica
Portrayed By: Kate Nash
An English girl from Bromley who moved to Los Angeles with aspirations of becoming a singer, only to find herself living in her car, before playing scientist Britannica in the ring.
- '80s Hair: Sports a big perm of red hair and a huge, vertically-sprayed fringe.
- Badass Bookworm: “Britannica” is a play on both her British nationality and the venerable Encyclopaedia Britannica, a tome of knowledge first published in 1768. She even occasionally brandishes an actual encyclopaedia in the ring.
- Brainless Beauty: She is the go-to Ms. Fanservice and extremely ditzy, which is ironic considering that her wrestling persona is based on intelligence.
- Dysfunctional Family: At a low point in her storyline in Season 2, she reveals that her parents are both alcoholics.
- Easily Forgiven: Even after she was set up to be framed by Justine, she said she wasn't mad and even talked Sam into not punishing her.
- Expy: The character of Britannica is based on both Godiva (as she’s British) and also Zelda the Brain from the original GLOW.
- Face: One of the GLOW good girls.
- Gentleman Adventurer: When the girls swap gimmicks in Season 3’s “Freaky Tuesday” episode, she switches with Carmen/Machu Picchu, but decides to mix things up further by playing her as “a British explorer who discovers Machu Picchu”, complete with bumptious RP accent.
- Groupie: Accompanied UK super-group Duran Duran on their first LA tour, had fun with the band, and decided to stay on in the US.
- Hidden Depths: Season 3 reveals that she is quite savvy with finances.
- The Illegal: She is revealed to be living in the United States illegally and she marries Bash for her green card.
- Lives in a Van: When first encountered, she’s been reduced to living in her car as her dreams of running away to LA to become a singer have faltered.
- Nerds Are Sexy: Britannica’s a beautiful girl sporting Nerd Glasses and a costume designed like a sexy British school uniform. She also has at least three stalkers.
- Nice Girl: Among the nicest in the entire series, she is cheerful, only very rarely raises her voice, and is very forgiving of people — even of Justine after the latter tried to frame her for the theft of Sam's camera.
- Nouveau Riche: She’s from the Wrong Side of the Tracks in South East London, but marries Bash at the end of Season 2, the wealthy son of a family that founded a food company, and is enjoying the trappings of being young and rich in the 1980s. However she is savvier about money than Bash, who needs her to create a savings account for his uncashed checks (often above three digits) at a local bank. Also, rather than go for a much more expensive tailored suit in red that her mother-in-law offers to buy for her, she picks a baby pink one that she knows is “less posh” but is closer to her own taste.
- Odd Friendship: With her mother-in-law Birdie, Bash's formidable mother, following her green-card marriage to Bash at the end of Season 2. Despite her humble background, Rhonda's plain-speaking sweetness, combined with the fact that she's respectful, yet not at all wobbled by an initially frosty interrogation, as well as her knack for managing Bash's finances, surprises and impresses Birdie, leading to a warmly mutual respect after a day out shopping together.
- Signature Move: Britannica’s signature move is the Spinning Wrist-lock.
- Sleeping with the Boss: She's sleeping with Sam in the first season, and she gets married to Bash live in the ring in the second Season finale.
- The Smart Guy: Her schtick amongst the GLOW Faces.
- Smart People Speak the Queen's English: Invoked as part of her character schtick, as the group's token Brit. In real-life though, she's more of a Brainless Beauty.
- Smart People Wear Glasses: In-universe only: she wears a pair of Nerd Glasses as part of her Britannica outfit. Averted in real life: she's hardly a genius, but she's sensible and level-headed.
- Stylistic Suck: The "rap" video she makes to promote GLOW.
- Three-Way Sex: What she ends up doing with Bash and a male prostitute (Paul) in Season 3, and although it originally was intended to be cuckoldry, it backfires on her when Bash clearly enjoys Paul's involvement.
- Throw the Book at Them: As Britannica, she usually carries a book to the ring, and has been seen hitting her opponents with it at least once.
Sheila
Sheila
Gimmick: The She-Wolf
Portrayed By: Gayle Rankin
An awkward young woman who insists upon wearing her she-wolf persona at all times, never breaking character.
- Almighty Predator: Sheila looks raggedy, but she can play the piano, answers questions on Jeopardy, and learns her lines quickly in her acting class. Before long, Sheila is so good that Ruth starts to worry about keeping her own skills sharp.
- Animal Motif: Wolves, clearly.
- As Herself: In-universe. Sheila doesn't have a wrestling gimmick (alter-ego/character) — she is a she-wolf in her eyes and is therefore essentially just playing herself.
- Birthday Hater: The girls find out that it's her birthday, and, led by Jenny, drag her roller-skating. Sheila ends up begrudgingly having a great time.
- Color Motif: Mostly dark colors and thick, black eyeliner. Abandons these in Season 3 because she recognises that it's stopping people from taking her seriously as an actress.
- Deadpan Snarker: On the same level as Justine.
- Defrosting Ice Queen: Is initially very anti-social and even puts a dead squirrel on Ruth's bed to get her to stay away. By the end of Season 2, she considers every member of the team to be a part of her pack.
- Ensemble Dark Horse: She becomes one in-universe, getting by far the most fan mail and even getting people doing impressive cosplays of her.
- Expy: The character of Sheila the She-wolf is partially based on the animalistic wrestling persona created by Dee Booher in the original GLOW, Matilda the Hun. They both proclaim their wild, feral-like demeanour during matches and wear animal furs and skins. Her debut match where she's wheeled in howling in an actual cage mirrors the psychotic Dementia's intro schtick from the original too.
- Loners Are Freaks: At first, until the girls come to accept her.
- Messy Hair: Messy wig. She ends up burning it in the desert, because it was "holding me back."
- Otherkin: She knows she's human, but she truly considers herself to be a wolf. She is disabused of this by Season 3 when, on being very dehydrated in the desert, she meets an actual wolf, or possibly has a vision of one, and it isn't remotely interested in her.
- She Cleans Up Nicely: Her appearance as Liza Minnelli in Season 3's Freaky Tuesday episode counts, and then she sheds her wolf persona entirely after recovering from dehydration during the team outing to the desert.Arthie: I've never seen her dressed as a human woman before.
- That Man Is Dead: Mid-way through Season 3, Sheila ditches her she-wolf persona (even burning her old wig and fur bodice). The main trigger is her meeting a real-life wolf on a trip to the desert, which simply ignores her, and her also deciding that she needs to do this to be taken seriously as an actress.
- Wrestling Monster: While she first insists that her wolf identification has nothing to do with werewolves, she comes to embrace the character by the time the pilot is filmed, being taken to the ring in a cage and howling.
Tammé
Tammé Dawson
Tammé as "Welfare Queen"
Gimmick: Welfare Queen
Portrayed By: Kia Stevens
After postponing her acting career in order to raise her son, Tammé is now throwing everything she has into her new wrestling career as one of GLOW's main Heels.
- Author Tract: Her whole wrestling persona is about how poor black women are abusing the benefits system to live like queens while the common working man suffers in poverty.
- Big Beautiful Woman: She's a voluptuous, attractive woman and sports amongst the most glamorous outfits of the group.
- Career Versus Family: Held back on her comedic and acting career after her son was born and regrets it.
- The Confidant: She is this for Debbie regarding being a working mother of a young son, given that she was a single mother for years and has successfully raised a son who now attends Stanford University, as well as giving Debbie advice on how to deal with sexism at work.
- Ensemble Dark Horse: Sam doesn't seem to have any clear plans for her at first, and her gimmick is rather thrown together based on her race and the costume she chose at the party. She quickly becomes a massive fan favorite among the wrestlers and audience alike however due to her charismatic performances, and Sam actually books her to beat Liberty Belle at the end of the first Season.
- Education Mama: She put her son first while he grew up, and is extremely proud he is at Stanford.
- Ethnic Scrappy: Meant to be reviled by the audience for her laziness. Yet it's more Love to Hate due to her charismatic performance.
- Everyone Has Standards: Welfare Queen may be brazen about spending the taxpayer's dollar on luxuries but she really dislikes bigotry.
- Game-Breaking Injury: Doing a show every night in Vegas takes a massive toll on her back, which she covers with wine and pills until she finally breaks down backstage. This also happens to be the same night Bash announces the show is being extended for a year.note
- Heel: She's presented as one of the main villains of the GLOW girls in her capacity as a brazen, work-shy woman who's living off the audiences' hard earned coin.
- Nice Girl: Friendly, kind, and supportive. She alternates between being a maternal figure and a friend to the younger women at work. She also takes the time to talk with a fast food employee about children, and offers support to Debbie when it comes to being stood up by Sam and Bash or the difficulties of being a single mom.
- Odd Friendship: With Debbie. Their wrestling personas are polar opposites; she is kind, friendly, and down-to-earth whereas Debbie can be a diva but she befriends and gives her emotional support on the basis that they are the only moms in the group of wrestlers.
- Sassy Black Woman: Witty and verbal yet very wise. But she also proves to be very sweet and friendly, even taking time to advise Debbie, as one mother to another.
- Signature Move: Welfare Queen’s signature move, due to her impressive strength, is the Airplane Spin.
- Token Religious Teammate: Her "Freaky Tuesday" Beatdown Biddie is a proud member of a church choir.
- Uncle Tom Foolery: Her son accuses her of playing a minstrel character. Her public humiliation after losing the crown doesn't help.
Melanie
Melanie Rosen
Melanie as "Melrose"
Gimmick: Melrose
Portrayed By: Jackie Tohn
A wild party girl and Jewish-American princess, she loves late nights and good-looking men.
- '80s Hair: Sports a huge bushy hair-metal ‘do with streaks of bright neon pink running through it.
- All Women Are Lustful: She enjoys male attention, is flirtatious with the male crew members, and she takes it very hard when she finds out that Justine (a younger teenager) has been having sex more than she has.
- It's suggested that she desires sex more than marriage in the finale of the Second Season.
- She suggests Ruth tell Russell to stop giving her hickeys and start performing his "suction" on her clitoris instead.
- Attention Whore: Shamelessly fakes a miscarriage (with a stolen bottle of ketchup) in the ring for laughs, causing Cherry to lose her shit and call her out over it.
- Berserk Button: Anti-Semitism or jokes about Jewish culture is one. Justified in that her father was a Holocaust survivor who lost his family and insists on living in a house with either an attic or basement in case the family ever had to hide.
- Cluster F-Bomb: Peppers her conversation with obscenities, whether she is angry or just having a laugh.
- Country Matters: Never afraid to drop the c-bomb.
- Easily Forgiven: After the incredibly cruel phoney-miscarriage prank she played on Cherry and stealing Ruth's good shoes in the second episode, as well as tattling on Debbie in the 6th, she was forgiven by all three and the rest of the girls and treated as if it never happened.
- Expy: The character of Melrose is based on glitzy party-girl Hollywood from the original GLOW.
- Fun Personified: Aims to be this trope, stating that she is the kind of girl who wakes up with nothing to do and will end up in a Van Halen video at the end of the day.
- Hard-Drinking Party Girl: Both her and her wrestling persona — she's essentially playing herself.
- Heel: One of the "bad girls" in the GLOW league.
- Heel Realization: Undergoes this in Season 3 where she realises just how much of a hypocrite she is about her casual racism towards Jenny's Asian heritage, given her sensitivity about her own Jewish heritage. When Jenny breaks down recounting how her family barely survived the Cambodian Genocide, much like Melanie's father barely survived the Holocaust, she tearfully apologises for how insensitive she's been.
- Hidden Depths: After a bunch of stereotypical Jewish jokes gets her accused of making a supposed parable for the group all about her, she breaks down weeping and reveals her aunt and eight cousins were killed in the Holocaust, and her father still worries it could happen again.
- Hypocrite: Eventually deconstructed in a Heel Realization, but until that point, Melanie had been the most frequent to express bigoted sentiments "for jokes", but would get deathly serious if anyone else made a remark about Judaism in jest. This is best seen in how utterly pissed she was when she saw Ruth testing out a Babushka character (bear in mind, Ruth is Ambiguously Jewish herself and was doing it out of fondness for the Russian Jewish family she had just been spending time with), but then when, for a bit, she swapped gimmicks with Jenny her impression of Asian culture was far more extreme than Ruth had done. Jenny calls her out on this, and when she learns about the Cambodian genocide, she tearfully apologises for how she's been acting.
- Jewish American Princess: She's Jewish and is a bratty party girl who drives her own limo around.
- Jewish Complaining: Does some very comedic complaining.
- Makeover Montage: When the GLOW girls create an MTV-style pop video, she stars as a thinly-veiled Expy of Madonna who, with her glamorous magic-touch and huge amounts of hairspray, helps the other girls get ready for a night at the club.
- Really Gets Around: She’s a self-confessed sex-maniac and very proud of it.
- Shaped Like Itself: Her wrestling persona is an '80s party girl who masters her sex appeal and is named Melrose.
- Spoiled Brat: She acts like an entitled, trolling bitch a lot of the time, and Cherry has her number almost immediately; she comes from a wealthy background, daddy pays all her bills, and she drives herself around in a limo for attention.
- Those Two Guys: with Jenny.
- Token Religious Teammate: She is very devoted to the teachings, history, and current events surrounding her religion and culture. Even serving an impromptu and improvised Seder at a campfire with the other girls.
Stacy & Dawn
Stacy Beswick & Dawn Rivecca
Stacy & Dawn as "The Beatdown Biddies"
Gimmick: Ethel & Edna Rosenblatt / The Toxic Twins
Portrayed By: Kimmy Gatewood and Rebekka Johnson
Best friends both inside and outside of the ring, Dawn and Stacey are also hair stylists for the cast of GLOW.
- '80s Hair: In a show populated with the voluminous coiffures of the decade, theirs are by far the most perfected and of-the-moment, given their profession.
- Alter Kocker: Ethel and Edna have strong Yiddish accents. However, they aren't Jewish themselves, and the Jewish Melrose accuses them of being anti-Semitic.
- The Bus Came Back: In-Universe with the Biddies, who get turned into the Toxic Twins in Season 2. In Season 3 for the Vegas floor show, the Biddies are reinstated.
- Chatty Hairdresser: Stacy was a hairdresser and says her clients found her and Dawn hilarious enough to be on TV.
- Expy: The characters of The Beatdown Biddies are based on The Housewives from the original GLOW, and The Toxic Twins are based on Spike and Chainsaw AKA The Heavy Metal Sisters.
- Fun Personified: Stacy, along with Dawn, abandon the Beatdown Biddies characters for very rock and roll, sexy wrestling personas, claiming that their self-esteem was being affected by playing two old ladies. In a PSA the girls are roped into, they're used to represent a fun party that a teenager could have gone to if pregnancy hadn't ruined her life.
- Heel: Both the Beatdown Biddies and the Toxic Twins are heels and pitted against the GLOW good girls.
- Innocently Insensitive: They often are crass and loud-mouthed, to the point of being Politically Incorrect Hero types, but their remarks about lesbians really shake Yolanda and Arthie.
- The Klan: For their very first match, the girls ditch The Biddies characters and go full on KKK in an incredibly distasteful (but pretty damn funny) tag-match with the African-American girls, Junkchain and Welfare Queen — whose idea the whole caper was, it should be noted.
- Never Mess with Granny: Parodied as her and Dawn's team the Beatdown Biddies.
- Nuclear Mutant: During a fight with Melrose, they get sprayed with nuclear waste and transform into the Toxic Twins.
- The Stoner: They get totally baked in Season one, and start making hilarious prank phone calls to the other girls. Later in Season 3, during a team trip out to the desert, the first thing they do is whip out a bong.
- Those Two Guys: They're practically inseparable, and the only formally established Tag Team in the GLOW roster. Discussed in Season 3's Bottle Episode "Outward Bound".
Arthie
Arthie Premkumar
Arthie as "Beirut the Mad Bomber"
Gimmick: Beirut the Mad Bomber
Portrayed By: Sunita Mani
An Indian-American pre-med student who takes the in-ring persona of Beirut the Mad Bomber, a Middle Eastern terrorist. She is also the backstage medic for the wrestlers.
- Academic Athlete: A serious medical student who also has great acrobatic and gymnastic skills, as evidenced by her cannonball and flip at the pool.
- Badass Bookworm: In season 1, she's a medical student who studies in between wrestling practices.
- Bollywood Nerd: Is Hindu and a medical student who studies frequently.
- Born-Again Immortality: Tries to do this with her Beirut character (with a "Phoenix" theme and all), but her thunder is literally stolen by the Biddies.
- Brainy Brunette: She's a dark-haired medical student.
- Expy: The character of Beirut is based on Palestina from the original GLOW, a self-proclaimed terrorist, who would throw down against the show's all-American heroes Americana and Babe the Farmer's Daughter — and would rile up the crowd by rapping, "I'll get you all, you're on my list/you can't escape this terrorist/so when you hear my battle cry/all infidels prepare to die."
- Foreign Wrestling Heel: A real button-pusher for the Reagan-era audience; an actual terrorist — especially in the wake of the TWA 847 hostage crisis.
- Hate Sink: In-Universe, her character winds up making her a little more this trope than she's comfortable with.
- Middle Eastern Terrorists: As part of her heel persona, albeit against her comfort.
- The Medic: She serves this role in the group, trying to steer the other women away from tampons to pads (preventing toxic-shock syndrome) and helping with a cut that Rhonda receives when some enraged audience members tried to target Beirut, but missed.
- Right Through His Pants: Yolanda and Arthie display this trope insofar as Yolanda makes love with her in the nude, but Arthie keeps her underwear on, the implication being that she's too inhibited to take it off. This leads to their first fight, after which Arthie lets Yolanda take her pants off.
- Romantic Wingman: Serves as this to Justine when she sees that Justine has a crush on Billy, and has a hard time approaching him; she orders pizza and leaves to study for 40 minutes so the two can have some alone time.
- Surprisingly Realistic Outcome: She ends up failing out of med school due to her wrestling schedule. However, she admits to Sam in Season 2 that she probably would have ended up failing anyway, and only even went there because her parents wanted her to.
- X-Pac Heat: When audience members react violently to her Beirut character, she's unnerved and seems to think that they hated her rather than just her character.
Reggie
Reggie Walsh
Reggie as "Vicky the Viking"
Gimmick: Vicky the Viking
Portrayed By: Marianna Palka
An Olympic medalist. She is originally given the "Liberty Belle" gimmick in the persona test, but because of a lack of personality, the gimmick is given to Debbie instead, and Reggie becomes "Vicky the Viking" due to her tall, athletic stature and blonde hair.
- The Big Guy: Easily the tallest, most physically intimidating woman in the team.
- Brawn Hilda: She's a fit, tall, broadly-built woman who isn't particularly feminine, which is why she was passed over for the "Liberty Belle" role in favor of the more feminine and conventionally beautiful Debbie.
- Bruiser with a Soft Center: Despite her stern appearance, she’s a pretty friendly person who hangs out with the cast regularly. Season 2 shows her to be very loyal and admiring of Ruth to the point of standing up for her to Sam and even getting fired for it.
- The Dragon: As a hugely built, intimidating viking, Vicky’s the perfect dragon for Zoya, and acts as the Final Boss for Liberty Belle in her quest to find kidnapped daughter, Savannah-Rose.
- Expy: The character of Vicky the Viking is based on Brunhilde from the original GLOW.
- Granola Girl: Shades of this. In season 3, she is able to navigate a hiking trail with nothing but the rock formations leading her, and is the most prepared for their camping trip.
- Heel: One of the GLOW bad-girls.
- Horny Vikings: Sports the prerequisite viking helmet and long blonde plaits as part of her gimmick.
- Naughty Nuns: Her "Freaky Tuesday" persona is not only Nun Too Holy, but she seems to have a very kinky streak.
- Nun Too Holy: Her "Freaky Tuesday" persona is a very menacing nun, along with being slightly kinky.
- Put on a Bus: Early in season 2, she gets fired for standing up to Sam, but The Bus Came Back when Ruth convinces Sam to rehire her later in the season.
- The Resenter: She was on the American Olympic wrestling team and a proud American, so her gimmick of "Vicky the Viking" clearly irks her. She responds to Debbie's pro-American speech by picking her up and hurling her across the ring while screaming that she used to be Liberty Belle. By Season 3, she seems to hold no real grudge against Debbie, although will snarkily bring it up from time to time.
Jenny
Jenny Chey
Jenny as "Fortune Cookie"
Gimmick: Fortune Cookie
Portrayed By: Ellen Wong
A Cambodian-American, Jenny takes on the role of Chinese stereotype "Fortune Cookie" in the ring, and is paired with Zoya the Destroyer as the Red Scare tag-team.
- Badass Adorable: Fortune Cookie is "Cute like Panda....but fast like Dragon!"
- Dark and Troubled Past: In Season 3 she reveals that her family was persecuted by the Khmer Rouge in her native Cambodia, and she is a survivor of ethnic cleansing. Playing a stereotypical Chinese communist every night ends up sending her into a depression.
- Dirty Communists / Yellow Peril: Her wrestling persona, an antagonistic Asian stereotype, pairs up with Soviet Zoya the Destroya in the final match of season 2 and in season 3 this tag-team continues.
- The Fashionista: Sports on-point 80s Californian fashion, of-the-moment hair and makeup, and uses her styling expertise to create the costumes for the shows. She ends up being promoted to GLOW's official costume designer, and is recognized and complimented by other artists in Las Vegas.
- Foreign Wrestling Heel: Teams up with fellow heel Zoya as part of their Red Scare communist schtick.
- Fun Personified: Likes going out, birthday parties, bold-colored make up, and is pretty upbeat most of the time.
- Good with Numbers: Pretty much figures out how much she needs to be paid for all the additional wardrobe work she does.
- Immigrant Patriotism: Ironically her comments on birthdays indicates she's quite the fan of western values, and not overly fond of her native Cambodia. Explained in season 3, when she reveals that her family fled from Cambodia to escape the Khmer Rouge.
- National Stereotypes: Really dislikes playing up her ethnicity as part of her Heel schtick, but also indulges in this herself when she plays Britannica in the "Freaky Tuesday" episode, and blunders onto the stage ranting about scones.
- Pink Is Feminine: Often seen wearing pastel-pink clothing, as well as pink makeup.
- Team Mom:
- Often concerned about the others (sometimes to smothering levels) and the only one practical enough to take a sewing machine to a live taping.
- In season 3, she brings the food for the campsite and fusses over people's costumes during Freaky Tuesday.
- Those Two Guys: with Melrose.
- Valley Girl: Has the mannerisms down pat, implied to be her fulfilling the American Dream. Given what one knows about Cambodian history from the 1960s-1980s
and her past, she is a refugee.
Yolanda
Yolanda Rivas
Yolanda as "Junkchain"
Gimmick: Junkchain
Portrayed By: Shakira Barrera
A Mexican-American lesbian stripper who replaces Cherry in the role of Junkchain in Season 2. Despite having no wrestling background, she excels with her dancing skills, especially breakdancing.
- But Not Too Gay: She is a proud lesbian but given the time period and having moved to a city she isn't familiar with, she acts straight so she avoids hostility, which pains her.
- Closet Key: Is this for Arthie.
- Dance Battler: Her first match against Zoya is a dance battle. It's implied that she incorporates her dance moves into her combat as she pulls a move while practicing a match.
- Good Bad Girl: She works as a stripper on the side but she's a very sweet and friendly person.
- Hypocrite: To some extent, she gets very upset by Stacie and Dawn's casual, unintentionally homophobic remarks, to the point she angrily labels them bigots. However, when Artie expresses she's not sure what her actual identifier is, and wonders if she even needs one, Yolanda dismisses her as a 'straight girl who's confused about what she is', which clearly upsets Arthie.
- Lipstick Lesbian: She likes women, and she's often dressed femininely with a full face of makeup.
- No Bisexuals: Espouses this view while falling out with Arthie; when Arthie brings up how she doesn't really identify as gay explicitly, Yolanda angrily accuses her of being a straight girl who's 'confused', seeing gay and straight as a pure binary with no alternate ground. Unfortunate Truth in Television as many bisexuals can attest to getting this treatment from lesbian and gay parts of the LGBT community; it was even more the case in the 1980s.
- Platonic Prostitution: She flirts with Mormon dealers at the casino just to make life easier — it's part of her closeted act to survive the unfamiliar in Vegas.
- Plug 'n' Play Friends: Downplayed — after some initial resentment over her taking Cherry's spot, the other women quickly accept her as a friend.
- Spicy Latina: Her wrestling character is this persona but Yolanda is a very sweet and even-tempered person of Latin descent.
G.L.O.W., K-DTV & Fan Tan Staff
Sam
Sam Francis Sylvia
Portrayed By: Marc Maron
A Sicilian-American exploitation film director hired to direct GLOW. He had directed eight films in the 1970s including Gina the Machina which was deemed so controversial that it was banned in 49 states. Sam has a chronic drug and alcohol addiction that has led to one divorce and multiple affairs with other women.
- Age-Gap Romance: He tends to date his actresses, even when they're much younger than him, and this includes when dating Rhonda/Britanica. He makes a drunken pass at Justine until he finds out she's his daughter, and her fan-girling over him is parental idolisation. Over the course of the second season, he slowly falls in love with Ruth, and is offended when she outlines the age difference as a reason why they can't date.
- Alliterative Name: Both actor and character alike.
- Chivalrous Pervert: This line says is best"I can't objectify you now that I know you're human!"
- Deadpan Snarker: Almost every other line out of his mouth is some sort of dry quip.
- Disappeared Dad: He's actually Justine's dad, and they only reconnect after 17 years when she joins GLOW purely to meet him.
- Expy: The character of Sam Sylvia is based on Matt Cimber, the irascible director of the original GLOW.
- Functional Addict: He's a habitual cocaine user on top of being a chain smoker, both of which are taking their toll on his health, but he's thus far been able to keep his habits from noticeably interfering with his work, even when he suffers a heart attack during a meeting.
- It's Been Done: He has been working for ten years to try and get his film Mothers and Lovers made, and was planning to use GLOW as a way to fund it. It turns out that shares too much with Back to the Future.
- Jerk with a Heart of Gold: He has a very abrasive personality and he is definitely a slightly misogynistic jerk but has his sweet moments when he shows that he really cares about the show. He also got some bonding moments with Ruth and helps her when she gets an abortion. He also sticks up for Ruth when she tells him that she was nearly raped by a TV executive.
- Never My Fault: Inverted. He admits that most of his projects tank because of his own mistakes, to the point that, when Ruth tells him that GLOW got moved to 2 AM because she rejected Tom Grant's advances, his first reaction is relief that it's not his fault for once, as he was already wracking his brains trying to figure out exactly where he had gone wrong. (His second reaction is attacking Grant's car with a crowbar.)
- Papa Wolf: In the 10th episode of Season 1, he finds out Justine (who is his illegitimate daughter) is seeing Billy the pizza boy, and gets violently overprotective of her.
- Parental Incest: Hitting rock bottom at a party, he puts the moves on Justine and kisses her. She recoils in horror and admits she's his daughter. Oops.
- Politically Incorrect Hero: Zig-Zagged. He has no problem indulging in stereotypes but also has no issue with actually hiring a diverse cast, such as the openly gay Yolanda, and shows no objection to Yolanda and Arthie getting together (actually telling the latter he finds them adorable). Keith describes him as “more sexist than racist” and it’s implied he was a former civil rights activist... who joined up to get laid. Overall, it's clear he's more insensitive to race issues rather than outright bigoted, and has issues with women that he's at least trying to deal with.
- Sir Swears-a-Lot: Almost everything out of his mouth is punctuated with "fuck" or "fucking".
Bash
Sebastian "Bash" Howard
Portrayed By: Chris Lowell
The heir to the Howard Foods business empire and producer of GLOW, as well as the promotion's ring announcer and commentator.
- '80s Hair: Sports a sculpted men’s perm like a Ken doll that gets pouffier as the series progresses. The barman at a gay bar he and the girls visit whilst looking for Florian even calls him “Malibu Ken”.
- Ascended Fanboy: He is a rich kid who decided to use his trust fund money to make his own wrestling show after years of being a devoted fan.
- Attention Deficit... Ooh, Shiny!: In season 3, Bash is shown to be easily distracted and excited by jugglers and magicians on the Las Vegas strip.
- Ambiguously Bi: Throughout the first season, it's heavily hinted he might be gay, and his "butler" Florian might actually be his lover, but nothing explicit is said about the subject. However, in season 2 he also claims to be in love with Rhonda, and actually marries her. It remained unclear whether his love is genuine, or whether he's in denial because of internalized homophobia, until his bisexuality was confirmed in season 3 when a gigolo Rhonda hires to pose as a handyman to flirt with her to make him jealous ends up participating in a threesome, with Bash kissing and fondling him.
- Armoured Closet Gay: After two seasons hinting at it, Bash is revealed to be gay or at the very least bisexual in Season 3 during a steamy threesome with a male gigolo (Paul) that Rhonda contrives to make him jealous. This backfires on her spectacularly when he passionately kisses and fondles Paul and she’s left feeling bypassed and confused. He's wracked by shame and refuses to admit it to himself, with his overbearing and conservative mother likely being one of the reasons, and the fear of AIDS being another.
- Expy: The character of Bash Howard is based on David Mclane, the producer of the original GLOW who was an avid wrestling fan, and recognized that there was a market for women's wrestling that wasn't being met.
- Genki Guy: Is very excitable and childlike in his enthusiasm.
- In Touch with His Feminine Side: Bash is very much in touch with his emotions, enjoys wearing makeup, has no issues holding Sam's hand at times, is very close with the wrestlers, and has an entire room in his house dedicated to playing dress up.
- In Vino Veritas: Only when he’s absolutely blind drunk does he come out and admit to Debbie that he thoroughly enjoyed having sex with Paul the gigolo, and would be unable to stop himself from doing it again.
- It's All About Me: His biggest fault — he's not really very self-aware, and can oftentimes be insensitive to others, whether that be a lack of racial awareness, or not respecting Debbie's position as a co-producer, which was done to make his workload easier. This is also largely what alienated Florian and ultimately led to his death, as he contracts AIDS while taking time away from Bash.
- It's All My Fault: Blames himself for Ruth's injury, because he's the one who encouraged everyone to exert themselves more.
- Manchild: Started GLOW because he really loves wrestling, is very excitable, irresponsible with money, and is easily persuaded by candy.
- Nice Guy: Especially when compared to Sam, he's very supportive and open to the suggestions of the wrestlers.
- Odd Friendship: With Carmen. He has barely met her when he pretends to be her boyfriend in order to convince her father to let her train as a wrestler. Later on, he confesses his money problems and the fact that the show might never make air to her.
- Politically Incorrect Hero: He's the one who suggests many of the more offensive characters the girls play, due to his rich conservative upbringing making him oblivious to the offence it could cause them. To him, it's purely a strategy for creating memorable Heel characters, as opposed to holding prejudiced ideas personally.
- Slogan-Yelling Megaphone Guy: In his capacity as the main ring-announcer for the GLOW matches.
- Upper-Class Twit: He's a trust-fund baby who ploughs his considerable inheritance purely into ventures that excite him and appeal to his own personal passions — wrestling being the number one.
Keith
Keith
Portrayed By: Bashir Salahuddin
Cherry's husband and stunt partner.
- Give Away the Bride: He escorts Rhonda/Britannica down the aisle for her televised wedding to Bash (both for the show and in real-life to avoid her being deported).
- Happily Married: To Cherry — they are often seen talking, boinking, joking, and supporting each other's ambitions.
- My Biological Clock Is Ticking: He confides to Cherry that he wants to start a family while she is still able to conceive. She is ambivalent because her career as a stuntwoman would be stalled or ruined by another pregnancy.
- Nice Guy: Very cheerful and good-natured, he gets along with Sam and Bash and the girls, even his wife's former tormentor, Melrose.
- Only Sane Man: Of the main male cast, he is this to Sam and Bash's impulsiveness, a better husband than Sam and Mark, and really knows how to handle violent audience members.
Glen
Glen Klitnik
Portrayed By: Andrew Friedman
An executive for North Hollywood-based K-DTV who picks up the broadcast rights of GLOW.
- Amoral Attorney: He tries to get out of delivering the news to the girls that they can't move to another network now that KD-TV is canning GLOW, due to the contract they wrote up.
- Bitch in Sheep's Clothing: Not so much a bitch as a Dirty Coward, but while Glen appears friendly enough with the girls and with Bash and Sam, it turns out he's an utter worm. When Tom Grant (the network head) arranges a 'meeting' with Ruth in his room, Glen is there to make Ruth comfortable before being quietly dismissed by Tom so he can make his move on Ruth, in a manner that makes it clear this isn't the first time and he knows the drill (making him complicit in potentially multiple rapes and sexual assaults).
- Malicious Misnaming: He gets called "Clit-Dick" a number of times.
Russell
Russell Barroso
Portrayed By: Victor Quinaz
A K-DTV camera operator who works on the GLOW tapings during Season 2. He dates Ruth in Seasons 2 and 3.
Sandy
Sandy Devereaux St. Clair
Portrayed By: Geena Davis
A manager and former showgirl of the Fan Tan Casino where GLOW performs.
- '80s Hair: Has a shoulder length mane of blown-out brown curls.
- Bait-and-Switch Tyrant: When Debbie first encounters Sandy, she presumes she'll be some sort of tyrannical bitch out to make trouble for the GLOW girls, but in fact she ends up being a mentor to Debbie and one the show's main advocates.
- Benevolent Boss: Very kind, generous, and helpful to the Rhapsody showgirls and the wrestlers of GLOW, even acting as a source of wisdom for Debbie (regarding being a woman in a managerial/producer role). She also goes so far as to make sure that Cherry didn't face any further consequences for her gambling debt and sat and comforted the newly-unemployed Rhaspody showgirls after Bash pulls his investment from the show.
- The Comically Serious: Often unknowingly funny in the dramatic gravitas with which she delivers her dialogue — especially when giving a eulogy for her former producer, Bernie Rubenstein.Sandy: He hated gum. And green eye-shadow......he always thought it looked tacky.
- The Mentor: Having Seen It All, she’s the perfect source of advice for the rather jaded Debbie.
- Silver Vixen: Played by 63 year old Geena Davis, and absolutely stunning when she puts on her old showgirl outfit.
- White-Dwarf Starlet: Averted. She used to be a showgirl and beauty queen in her youth, but started working behind the scenes at the Fan-Tan Casino and as a performer for the Libertine; she tells Debbie that being older and working above and behind the scenes is fantastic compared to still being a starlet who is dependent on the approval of men.
Bobby
Bobby Barnes
Portrayed By: Kevin Cahoon
A drag performer who befriends and mentors Sheila.
- Camp Gay: Which is why the fact that he was married and has a seven year old son comes as a surprise to the GLOW team.
- Drag Queen: Impersonates Barbra Streisand, Liza Minnelli, and Carol Channing on the regular and even lent Sheila his wig and costume for Liza.
- Magical Queer: A mild example, though he does impart quite a bit of advice to the girls, and takes a few of them under his wing.
- The Mentor: For Sheila (and some of the other women in the GLOW team) — he's instrumental in helping her to ditch the permanent wolf persona and explore her capabilities as an actress.
Paul
Paul
Portrayed By: Nick Clifford
A hotel guest (and gigolo) at the Fan Tan hotel.
- Closet Key: Potentially for Bash. During a threesome Rhonda cooks up to make Bash jealous, Paul and Bash passionately kiss and fondle each other, which is the first on-screen confirmation of Bash's sexuality.
- Dramatically Missing the Point: Melrose assumes that Paul will be paying to have sex with her — little does she realise it's absolutely the other way round in his eyes.
- Male Frontal Nudity: After having sex with Melrose, he lets it all hang out.
- Mr. Fanservice: Gets butt-naked in his scenes with Melrose, and later takes part in a threesome with Rhonda and Bash wearing only a skimpy thong.
- The Oldest Profession: Melrose has sex with him, but discovers that he is a gigolo and they argue about her not paying for his services. It's implied that Sandy is Paul's pimp, as she openly acknowledges his presence at the casino.
- Unwitting Pawn: When Rhonda becomes concerned about Bash, as they have not had sex for months, she borrows Paul from Melrose as a means to get Bash to notice her again. However, the planned flirtation becomes a threesome, with Bash telling Debbie afterwards that he enjoyed having sex with Paul.
Family & Friends
Mark
Mark Eagan
Portrayed By: Rich Sommer
Debbie's now ex-husband who cheated on her with Ruth.
- Endearingly Dorky: When trying to reconnect with his wife, Mark earnestly leans in to doing exactly what he learned in marriage counselling. It's so bad, but it’s enough to show he is honestly trying, which is probably why Debbie stays (a little while).
- Hate Sink: In the first Season at least, where he symbolizes some of the worst traits of ostensibly straight-laced Reagan-era yuppies. In addition to cheating on his wife, it's clear that he's very unsupportive of her.
- Hidden Depths: Subtle, but there.
- At the end of the first episode, during her outburst, Debbie blurts out that Mark was the one who admitted to the affair with Ruth.
- He learned to cook while Debbie left him and honestly tries to learn from his mistakes, using his marriage counselling exercises.
- Informed Flaw: He’s constantly noted to be unattractive but that's not really the case, as he managed to bag Debbie (and sleep with Ruth) and it wasn't for his money, as Debbie was working when they started dating.
- Kavorka Man: Harry freakin' Crane managed to sleep with and knock up both Debbie and Ruth (for reference, the latter played Trudy Campbell). The line to file your complaints about the injustices in the world starts here.
- Stay in the Kitchen: Subtle but there. It becomes apparent that he has always tried to belittle Debbie's professional achievements and thus to encourage her to be, and stay, a housewife. Has a mild case of My God, What Have I Done? in the final episode when Debbie tells him he's never been supportive of her.
- Took a Level in Kindness: In Season 2 Mark does this hard. He takes the divorce much better than Debbie and he even starts dating his secretary. He does everything he can for his and Debbie's son and is shown to be nothing but a good father. The one time he gets mad is entirely justified when Debbie forgets to pick up their son and sells all the items from inside their house. All he does is calmly tell her off for it. He's a changed for the better man.
- Ugly Guy, Hot Wife: Discussed between Ruth and Sam after he first sees him; he is shocked that the pudgy, bespectacled yuppie managed to marry and reproduce with the gorgeous and shapely blonde Debbie and boink pretty and leggy Ruth — twice! Later he starts a relationship with a pretty brunette work-colleague.Sam: Even I'm better looking than him.
Billy
Billy Offal
Portrayed By: Casey Johnson
A pizza delivery boy that Justine calls and later becomes her boyfriend.
- '80s Hair: Holy crap, yes — a huge bouffant quiff. God alone knows the hairspray required.
- First Love: Is Justine's first boyfriend.
- Freaky Fashion, Mild Mind: Is a wannabe punk rocker but works a steady job and plays board games.
- Formerly Fit: In Season 3, Justine states that he's put on weight, but is "still cute."
- Nice Guy: He's a wannabe punk rocker, but is among the nicest of the male cast.
- Pretty Boy: Justine and Arthie sure think so, and with his cherubic face and too-cool hair, it’s not hard to see why.
Goliath
Goliath Jackson
Portrayed By: Winston James Francis
Carmen's father and wrestling legend.
- Back for the Finale: He reappears in the 10th (and final) episode of Season 1to give his support to his daughter.
- The Big Guy: Is a literal giant ex-wrestler.
- Cruel to Be Kind: Puts down his daughter's desire to wrestle because he knows women aren't respected in wrestling during the 80s.
- Jerkass Has a Point: Being the 1980s he's not wrong when he tells his daughter that women are a side show in wrestling.
- Stay in the Kitchen: Appears he wants Carmen to do this when he mentions wanting her to marry a "nice man" and to start a family but makes it clear that he'd rather have her work at an occupation where people would respect her rather than the circus side show of women's wrestling.
Birdie
Birdie Howard
Portrayed By: Elizabeth Perkins
Bash's intimidating, fashionable arch-Republican Mother
- Deadpan Snarker: Her tone when speaking to Bash.Birdie: (regarding Bash getting cut off from his allowance) Oh sit down, you're embarrassing yourself. We're not on Falcon Crest.Birdie: (To Rhonda, who thinks Birdie is joking about Bash inheriting 40 million from his grandfather's trust) Oh yes, I'm the comic relief.
- Fashionista: Decked out in the haute couture and preppy fashions of the 80s, she looks amazing.
- First-Name Basis: Everybody calls her Birdie, including her own son, Bash.
- I Want Grandkids: Or at least while she is still young enough to be mistaken for their mother.
- Jerk with a Heart of Gold:
- When Bash drags the wrestlers over to Birdie's benefit dinner, and has them all make phoney speeches about overcoming drug addiction in an attempt to extract sponsorship money from the wealthy crowd, she recognizes it as baloney immediately, but Ruth's candid speech about her affair with "a friend's husband" and subsequent regret, moves her enough to offer GLOW a room at the Hayworth Hotel for the show.
- She also develops a kinship with Rhonda, recognizing her as someone who can steer Bash in the right direction and love him for who he is.
- Jerkass Has a Point: She really does want Bash to really do something worthwhile and start making stable financial decisions. "Redistributing" the funds Bash got from the phoney crack addiction stories into her actual drug relief programs counts.
- Lady in Red: She appears in a somewhat militaristic red tweed suit that adds to her intimidating persona.
- Power Hair: For her reappearance in Season 3, her hair is styled more in line with the then First Lady Nancy Reagan and also Margaret Thatcher in contrast to her longer, more elaborate looking hair in Season 1.
- Preppy Name: "Birdie" is a classic, faintly ridiculous, wealthy American female WASP name.
- Rich Bitch: She is so intimidating that Debbie tells Ruth not to look directly into her eyes. She also initially looks down on the perfectly lovely Rhonda, purely because she perceives her to be of the wrong background for her son.
- White Anglo-Saxon Protestant: A classic example of the wealthy, cold, emotionally distant WASP-y mom. She is initially enormously disapproving of Bash's marriage to Rhonda (despite her being an actual Anglo-Saxon, no less!) due to her Wrong Side of the Tracks background. Softens (in typical WASP style) when she finds out that Rhonda is good at managing Bash's money.
- "Well Done, Son" Guy: She's this for Bash, being emotionally unsupportive, and never having watched his show, claiming she doesn't watch TV but then makes a reference to the then-popular soap Falcon Crest. She does express pride in how he married a suitable woman (Rhonda), however.
Florian
Florian Becker
Portrayed By: Alex Rich
Bash's Butler and (maybe) boyfriend.
- Childhood Friends: After Florian leaves when his pay-cheque bounces, Bash looks longingly at a photo of the two of them as children when they attended a wrestling show together. It's apparent that they were childhood friends who used the ‘butler’ pretext so they could keep hanging out into adulthood without getting 'real' jobs.
- Childhood Friend Romance: Ambiguously a case of this, depending on whether he and Bash were in fact lovers. Given Bash's internalised homophobia and rejection of his own homosexual leanings, though, its equally likely Florian was instead a Patient Childhood Love Interest.
- The Jeeves: His “job” is to act as Bash’s butler and he’s actually a pretty good host when the girls all pile over to Bash’s place for a house-party.
- Put on a Bus: Disappears early in season 2 due to Bash writing him a cheque that bounced.
- Bus Crash: Near the end of the season, Bash gets a phone call telling him that Florian has died, “technically from pneumonia” but in fact what is very strongly implied to be AIDS.
Rosalie
Rosalie Biagi
Portrayed By: Annabella Sciorra
Justine's feisty, somewhat overbearing Mother.
- '80s Hair: Her hair is a very voluminous perm.
- Precision F-Strike: Her first appearance (at the end of "The Good Twin") has her doing this, at the realization that her teenage daughter is doing background acting work on a cable access show directed by her one-night stand.
- Single Woman Seeks Good Man: She is very happy being married to her current husband (a stable father of two boys) after dating a series of guys who were "hot and cold" with her.
- Wicked Stepmother: Averted. She is married to another man (it is implied to be a recent marriage) who has two "shy" sons who she focuses much of her attention on, to the chagrin of her teenage daughter.
Ray
Ray
Portrayed By: Horatio Sanz
Father of one of Justine's classmates and the owner of a strip club chain.
- Benevolent Boss: He's the owner of a chain of strip joints and a casino in Vegas. Yolanda mentions that he is very trustworthy, pointing out he's her boss.
- Chekhov's Gunman: Sam meets him at Justine's school dance in the penultimate episode of Season 2 and he attends the taping of the final show in the finale, after which he offers the cast and crew a job in Vegas.
Gary
Gary
Portrayed By: Marc Evan Jackson
Birdie's butler.
- Jerk with a Heart of Gold: He first appears as Birdie's gatekeeper, greeting Bash and the girls with barely-concealed contempt. However, when Bash tries to track down Florian, Gary softens and doesn't hesitate to help him.
- Old Retainer: Likely has been working for the Howard family for a long time, given that he is wise to Bash's antics and why Birdie has low-tolerance for them — he must have seen him grow up.
