Ari Emanuel on Outrunning ‘Entourage,’ the Art of the Phone Call and the Stolen Commission that Still Hurts

The Thomas Guide is a map that painstakingly details how to navigate Los Angeles by car. It’s a spiral-bound relic that almost none of your junior executives remember. Your assistant thinks it’s a ranking of pale British heartthrobs. Your intern will stare at you, unblinkingly and for minutes, if you even ask. But Ari Emanuel […] Ari Emanuel dissects the art of the phone call, the stolen commission that still keep him up at night and the unholy rise of the text message. The Thomas Guide is a map that painstakingly details how to navigate Los Angeles by car. It’s a spiral-bound relic that almost none of your junior executives remember.

Your assistant thinks it’s a ranking of pale British heartthrobs. Your intern will stare at you, unblinkingly and for minutes, if you even ask. But Ari Emanuel has used it as a kind of blueprint to build an empire. The familiar byways of Century City, the lofty heights of the Bird Streets, the humble beginnings south of Olympic Boulevard — he’s traveled all of them. The guide is also one of the ways the super agent anchors “Roll the Calls,” a memoir of the TKO chief executive and WME Group executive chairman’s