This week’s release of “Horrible Bosses” made me think of some of the other terrible bosses in movies.  Here are some of the bosses we love to hate on screen.  Who am I leaving out?  And which movie boss is most like your all-time worst boss?

The all-time bad movie boss champ has to be Kevin Spacey, who adds to his list by appearing in “Horrible Bosses” as a cruel, manipulative, and paranoid company president.  I’m going to limit him to two on this list, but could choose others as well.

1.  Kevin Spacey in Glengarry Glen Ross There’s no meaner workplace in cinema history than this brutal and back-stabbing real estate company.  Spacey’s electrifying performance shows that his self-loathing is only exceeded by his contempt for everyone around him.  (Special credit to Alec Baldwin for a stunning turn as a guy from the home office brought in to give a pep talk:  “Second prize is a set of steak knives. Third prize is you’re fired.”)

2. Kevin Spacey in Swimming With Sharks Reportedly, this screenplay was inspired by the author’s own experience.  The assistant in the story gets his revenge on his sadistic bully of boss by torturing him, but in real life he just put his most appalling behavior up on screen.

3.  Gary Cole in Office Space He doesn’t yell.  He does not insult his staff.  He is just massively inconsiderate, making inane and dehumanizing and agonizingly insincere “requests.”  I don’t know which is worse — the cover on the TPS reports or Hawaiian Shirt Day.  (Special credit to screenwriter Mike Judge, the movie’s screenwriter, as Jennifer Aniston’s boss at Chotchkie’s, who tells her she should have more than the minimum flair.)

4. Sandra Bullock in The Proposal Everyone is terrified of this greyhound-slim and rattlesnake-mean editor, who can make the slightest error into a career-killer.

5.  Fred MacMurray in The Apartment Jack Lemmon discovers that the only way to get ahead in this enormous insurance company is to let the boss use your apartment for his assignations.

6. Sigourney Weaver in Working Girl She pretends to support her assistant’s dreams for advancement, but instead, she steals her ideas.  I love her line about why she is sure her boyfriend (Harrison Ford in a magnificent performance) will propose: “We’re in the same city now, I’ve indicated that I’m receptive to an offer, I’ve cleared the month of June… and I am, after all, me.”

7. Dabney Coleman in 9 to 5 Based on interviews with many working women, Coleman’s character was designed to exemplify just about every awful characteristic: lazy, sexist, dishonest, incompetent, and predatory.

8. Alistair Sim in A Christmas Carol Until he learns a lesson from the three Christmas ghosts, Scrooge is a demanding, nasty, and of course very cheap boss who keeps poor Bob Cratchit underpaid and shivering in the cold.

9. Charles Laughton in Mutiny on the Bounty Based on a real-life story, Laughton plays Captain Bligh, whose cruel treatment of his men led to a mutiny, putting him off the ship in a launch.  (The real-life Bligh was exonerated after making it back to England in what is still an un-matched feat of navigational skill.)

10. Denzel Washington in Training Day Ethan Hawke plays a young police officer assigned to work with Washington’s character, a corrupt narcotics detective who manipulates and blackmails him, drawing him into a quagmire of corruption.  Washington won an Oscar for his dazzling performance of a man who loves control but is losing his capacity to maintain it.

Dishonorable mention: Paul Giamatti as Howard Stern’s boss in “Private Parts,” Meryl Streep in “The Devil Wears Prada,” Laura Linney in “The Nanny Diaries,” and Tom Cruise in “Tropic Thunder”

Many thanks to David Apatoff and Christopher Orr for sharing their suggestions.

Allen Zadoff‘s terrific new book is My Life, the Theater, and Other Tragedies, about a high school theater techie (he works lights in a production of “Midsummer Night’s Dream”) who likes to stay behind the scenes until he meets a pretty transfer student who is suddenly put into one of the starring roles. It is funny, smart, and filled with authentic details and a lot of heart. You can win prizes for your own school theater group by uploading a picture of the book in a theatrical setting to the contest page.  You might find yourself in the paperback edition!  Stay tuned for an interview with Zadoff coming soon.

This filmed version of Lanford Wilson’s Fifth of July is a brilliantly acted story of the complicated relationships of a group of friends and relatives who get together over the 4th of July holiday.  It centers around the relationship of Kenneth Talley, Jr. (Richard Thomas), a disabled Vietnam vet in a wheelchair and his partner Jed (Jeff Daniels), his sister June (Joyce Reehling) and recently widowed aunt Sally (Helen Stenborg), and his old friends, a  wealthy couple named John and Gwen (Swoosie Kurtz in her Tony award-winning role).  It is a searing but ultimately hopeful and healing story of very real characters and also a thoughtful commentary on the Vietnam era.  This is one of three plays the gifted Wilson wrote about the Talley family, and it is a part of the superb series of Broadway Theater Archive productions that brought the best of live theater to Showtime audiences in the early 80’s.

A new DVD 3-pack of all three “Gidget” movies comes out today, and they’re worth another look, especially the 1959 original with Sandra Dee and James Darren.  Dee plays Francie, a sheltered and somewhat naive girl who thinks that it is still to make a fuss over boys.  But she is very interested in this new all-male activity on the beach called surfing and the cusp-of-the-60’s pre-counter culture guys who are devoted to it.  Their leader is played by Cliff Robertson as a pilot who is taking a break from real life to live on the beach (literally).  They take her on as something of a mascot, calling her Gidget (girl plus midget), and everybody has some growing up to do.  It’s probably not as sugary as you recall and it holds up pretty well.  The story, by the way, was inspired by the daughter of the author, Frederick Kohner.  You can see the real-life Gidget, still surfing, in the wonderful documentary, Step Into Liquid.

In the first sequel, “Gidget Goes Hawaiian,” Deborah Walley takes over for Dee and Darren returns.  A romantic misunderstanding arises when a mean girl spreads a rumor that Gidget and her boyfriend have gone what in those days was called “all the way.”  Everything is straightened out and Gidget’s good girl reputation is protected.  Watch for a very cute dance number with Broadway hoofer Michael Callan, the original Riff in the stage production of “West Side Story.”

The third episode is the weakest, with Cindy Carol as Gidget and a silly jealousy story, but the wonderful Jessie Royce Landis is a treat as something of a drowsy chaperone.  I still think of this movie whenever I hear the names Paolo and Francesca.

And don’t forget the Gidget television series, starring Sally Field, which included a guest-star appearance from her fellow future Oscar winner Richard Dreyfuss.