1. I have watched a lot of reality television in my life. I genuinely believe that no one has watched more. It’s for that reason that I believe I can say with authority that tonight’s episode of The Celebrity Apprentice was the most shocking two hours of television that I have ever seen. I believe it was 120 minutes of unadulterated voyeuristic entertainment that we will be discussing for an extended period of time.
2. While I would like to go through the two episodes chronologically, it is simply impossible to do that this week. We have to start with PhoneGate. While it was advertising as being a jaw-dropping moment, I certainly didn’t expect the Kenya and Vivica’s feud to degenerate into the vicious name-calling that it did. I absolutely never thought that I ever hear one celebrity refer to another as a “toxic trick” on The Celebrity Apprentice, and ultimately that is exactly what happened as Vivica tore into Kenya for allegedly stealing her cell phone and tweeting that she had menopause from it. It’s almost too surreal to believe. Why do I believe that the Kenya/Vivica battle will be remembered as a landmark moment in the annals of reality television? It’s primarily because it humanized both. It blurred the line between the regular edition of The Apprentice from yesteryear and its Celebrity successor. It was the first time where I genuinely felt real and raw emotion between two celebrities on the show, where the notion of keeping up appearances was thrown out the window and that it really was just a depiction of two women who absolutely despise each other. Those moments are the ones that drew me to reality television in the first place and continue to keep me enthralled.
3. PhoneGate reminded me of Anand from the show’s “Second Chance” season in 2010. Anand, described as a ‘struggling business owner,’ was fired after Mr. Trump learned that the project manager had contacted his friends to purchase pedicab rides at a higher rate (ensuring he would raise more money). Trump fired him for cheating although I am sure Anand is laughing somewhere as on The Celebrity Apprentice, contestants are encouraged to get their friends to do this.
4. Team Vortex’s idea to use Kenya’s rear end to promote Kings Hawaiian sweet buns was absolutely fascinating to watch. I believe that the task asked the teams to create a photo bomb image and not a photo bum image, and I still can’t believe that this idea was presented to the executives. You couldn’t have scripted a better episode.
5. #Babylovesbuns ? Seriously?
6. Did anyone see a similarity between the way that Kenya Moore was depicted on this season of The Celebrity Apprentice and how Aubrey O’Day was portrayed on the last one?
7. I did a quick poll amongst a small circle of my fellow Celebrity Apprentice devotees, and they all seemed to think that it would have been impossible for Kenya to have cracked the password on Vivica’s phone. On Twitter, however, this seems to be the minority opinion. What do you think?
8. While I usually agree with Donald Trump’s decisions, I think it is a travesty of justice that Team Infinity was annihilated after winning 5 tasks in a row. Leeza is the only surviving member after being sent to Vortex and this is something that I will always wonder about. There has to be more to the story.
9. Ian shouldn’t have been fired. We all know it. He didn’t come up with the jungle, has raised an incredible amount of money for his charity and truly should have been in the finale against Leeza. While Trump also eliminated Brandi and Johnny, Ian should have stayed in the contest.
10. Where were Ian’s final words?
