Several years ago, Phil Mickelson was one of a handful of pros who made a cameo on the movie “Tin Cup,” but he also made a not-as-well-known cameo on the HBO series “Entourage.” And the latter came despite the show taking a shot at the six-time major’s champ most famous major blowup.
Actor Jerry Ferrara, who played Turtle on “Entourage,” was the guest on this week’s GOLF Subpar Podcast, and during it he talked about his sports fandom, love of golf, auditioning for “Entourage” and more. One of the topics that came up was Mickelson’s cameo in season five, episode six, when he joined Jeremy Piven, who played Ari Gold, on the golf course.
In a past episode, Piven’s character took a jab at Mickelson’s 2006 U.S. Open loss at Winged Foot.
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“One of the lines in the Yom Kippur episode,” Ferrara said, “when Ari is not allowed to use his phone and we are trying to get the ‘Medellin’ movie made or whatever, and Ari says I think to his wife, ‘The guy is melting down worse than Phil Mickelson at Winged Foot.'”
But Ferrara and Kevin Dillon, who played Johnny “Drama” Chase on the show, were playing golf in the San Diego area one day when they saw Mickelson finishing up his round. Dillon introduced himself.
“[Dillon] said, ‘You should come do a cameo on the show,'” Ferrara said. “And I think he said like, ‘Sorry we made that joke about you.’ And Phil, to his credit, was like ‘No, I thought it was hysterical.’ He’s like, ‘I watch the show, it didn’t bother me at all. I’d definitely come on.'”
Within a few weeks it was put together and Mickelson made his appearance. (You can watch the clip here, although it involves some NSFW language.)
“He couldn’t have been nicer and happy to be there,” Ferrara said. “We even got to play a few holes. Watching him hit like a 320-yard stinger that was 10 feet off the ground the whole time at a Trump course in L.A. Yeah, he was awesome.”
Ferrara added that Dillon’s dad, Paul, was a portrait painter, and he made one of Mickelson to gift to him but accidentally painted Mickelson as a right-handed golfer. No matter; Mickelson still displayed it in his house because he thought it was a great talking point.
And, for what it’s worth, Ferrara said Mickelson’s acting skills were good.
You can listen to the entire Subpar Podcast below, or watch it on YouTube here.