The Celebrity Apprentice Episode 9-05 Review

Shows

The trend of doing a task to win money continues as the teams are given the project of creating a 30 second ad and a 10 second “viral video” for Right Guard. Curtis and Holly became the project managers, and the task turned out to be 4 on 4.5 as Sharon sounded like she was going to cough out a lung and Cyndi only returned for the final day due to having to meet that President Obama guy. I’ve heard he’s something of an important person. Your observers for the week are Ivanka and George Ross. George, by the way, rules. This is not open for debate.

But before they start there is a free throw shootout to win $10,000 for the PM’s charity. The upshot of this is that everyone misses except Maria, who is wearing decidedly non-regulation basketball shoes – that is, boots with 6-inch heels.

So with teams down to four apiece they’re assigned a NBA Hall-of-Fame player to use in the ads as they see fit. Tenacity gets former Chicago Bull Scottie Pippen, and RockSolid gets former Portland Trail Blazer Clyde “the Glide” Drexler, who Michael identifies to Curtis (since Curtis doesn’t know basketball) as being a former Houston Rocket. Which is true and all, but I don’t know too many people outside of Houston to consider him a Rocket – and I seem to recall people in Houston associating him more with the University of Houston (Phi Slama Jama) than the Rockets.

Also kind of funny here was that Michael Johnson noted that he knew Clyde from being in the Olympics together. It’s funny because Johnson surely knew Pippen as well, seeing as he was also on the “Dream Team”.

Anyway, each team puts a concept together, with Bret in his crazy way coming up with a 30 second story, and Holly developing a “funky Godfather”, going so far as to call up Right Guard spokesman Chris Paul (of the New Orleans Hornets) to see if he likes the concept. This of course is a moot point, since Paul has no say as to what goes into the product.

It’s at this point that I remembered that in previous shows, a funny concept or “viral video” doesn’t necessarily win this type of task, because the executives seem to have no idea of what, exactly, a viral video is. It’s also possible that they have no idea what YouTube is outside of being a part of Google. So if all things are equal, it’s usually the concept that is not funny but emphasises the product better that is the choice of the executives.

It’s somewhere around this point that Bret learns that his 9-year old daughter is showing signs of having diabetes. Bret actually manages to keep focus throughout the rest of the task, but he’s understandably distraught.

So we see the teams go through the filming process, and sure enough Clyde is wearing a Rockets uniform. Sadly, it’s the current Rockets uniform, which Drexler has never worn. Both ex-players are having fun throughout this, so there’s no issues there.

What is an issue is that, during the setup for filming, Selita appears to be doing nothing, which is noted by George. George doesn’t like slackers.

So now the filming has wrapped up, and the teams have 5 hours for editing. There’s really no issues with the 30 second spots, so it comes down to the 10 second “viral” ads the next day. Holly opts to cut down the 30 second spot, which is normally a good idea from a marketing perspective. However, this is not a normal situation, and you can sense the “I’ve got a bad feeling about this” vibe.

Cyndi, by the way, is back, and immediately tries to squeeze in a little work by layering her voice under Holly’s “Funky Godfather” jingle. Maria is tasked with editing down the 10 second spot on her own while Holly, Summer and Cyndi work on the presentation. Selita appears to do nothing, and when Maria calls for someone to take a look at the 10 second spot, no one helps. And there’s another mistake, because as PM, someone should be asked to add a second set of eyes to the video, and Selita really wasn’t doing anything.

So with about a minute to go (we know this because Summer is counting down for us) they finally look at Maria’s edits and a drop is out of place. Nothing they can do about it at this point, so time to head to the presentations.

RockSolid is up first, and their presentation is very fluid, incorporating all the team members and their life experiences. However, their video fails to even get the executives to crack a smile – which in the grand scheme of things means nothing. The women, in contrast, let Cyndi do some talking. This is never a good idea, because Cyndi is Cyndi. But they do elicit some laughs from the executives.

In talking to Trump, you get the feeling that the executives liked Tenacity’s ads better except for the whole unoriginal 10 second spot thing. We don’t get to hear who wins yet, but we do get to see Michael Johnson dropping out for personal reasons. I would assume that had the men lost, noone would get fired.

But as it turns out Tenacity lost, and got to face Trump in the Boardroom. Trump immediately gives immunity to Cyndi and Sharon for not being around for (much of) the task, and Summer is apparently safe because it’s hard to target a person who has worked hard every task. Asked to single out a weak player, Maria learns from the first week and names Selita, which George concurs with. That was pretty much the kiss of death right there for Selita.

Regardless, Holly has no choice but to take Selita and Maria to the final Boardroom, and Selita is fired basically because Holly and Maria stood up for themselves. Probably the correct decision, because strong opinions mean a greater likelihood of conflict among the contestants, and better television overall.

And now we get the most ridiculous part of the episode where Selita sashays out to the limo-taxi during the Walk of Shame. I realize that they tape all the exits at the beginning of the season, but the idea is that you’ve been fired and are walking out disappointed, not like a Victoria’s Secret model.

Money Earned [Total (Current Task)]:
Bret Michaels – $100,000
Selita Ebanks – $20,000
Maria Kanelis – $20,000
Summer Sanders – $20,000
Curtis Stone – $20,000 ($20,000)
Carol Leifer – $10,000
Holly Robinson Peete – $10,000 ($10,000)

Project Manager Standings:
Selita Ebanks (1-0)
Maria Kanelis (1-0)
Bret Michaels (1-0)
Curtis Stone (1-0)
Summer Sanders (1-0)
Rod Blagovich (0-1)
Michael Johnson (0-1)
Cyndi Lauper (0-1)
Holly Robinson Peete (0-1)
Sinbad (0-1)
Carol Leifer (0-0)
Darryl Strawberry (0-0)

Kevin has been an Insider since 2003, writing on a variety of topics ranging from The Amazing Race to Mixed Martial Arts. His current hobbies include Fantasy Football, Sporcle, travelling, making liberal use of his DVR and wondering what the heck he's gonna do when his two daughters are old enough to date. You can follow Kevin on Twitter (@starvenger).