Riding Coattails: Tough Cookies

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Forgive me for not writing about anything other than The Apprentice in recent weeks, but honestly, I think it’s the best reality show this fall. Wannabe Martha’s version is a joke and total waste of time. The Amazing Race: Family Edition has taken an unbearable turn as Phil Keoghan now has to inform 9-year-olds that they have been eliminated from the race. And Survivor: Guatemala could be good, but Burnett was an idiot and brought back Bobby Jon and Steph. The editors have focused way too much on those two, thus arresting the character development of the other players and making this week’s tribe shuffle confusing and uneventful. Come on, Mark, if a diehard fan such as myself has trouble keeping track of tribal lines, how is the less obsessive viewer going to fare? I’m totally bored with this season and am hoping that things will improve as the pool of players continues to shrink.

By stark contrast, the current season of The Apprentice is in top form. Purists might argue that the first season was the best, but I believe that each successive season has been better than the last, with Kendra’s victory over Tana being one of the best moments in reality TV’s short but distinguished history. Even though a few personalities of The Apprentice 4 have yet to emerge (Brian, James, Felisha), I found it easy to latch onto my favorites early on, which is a sign of good casting and strategic editing. Of course, Murtz’s interviews with past apprentice hopefuls have revealed that editing often portrays players as more evil or nicey nice than they truly are in real life, but that’s what these folks signed on for. It’s not fair, but it’s part of the game.

As are the candidates’ continued assumptions that because they’re men, women, bankers, event planners, or have really big hair and high cheekbones (yes, I’m talking to you, Jennifer M.), they’ll succeed on a task. Last week, the men were shocked to lose the Lamborghini task because they assumed that possession of a Y chromosome translated into mad skills when it came to advertising a fast, expensive car. Likewise, the women this week were already doing a victory dance when they learned that their assignment involved hanging out with senior citizens. Capital Edge expected that the seniors, to whom they presented a technology exposition, would fall madly in love with their adorable faces and be reminded of their own sweet granddaughters. Turns out Kristi’s dimples and Jen M.’s sexy workout demonstrations weren’t enough to deliver a win.

No, the secret to winning this task was serving good cookies, apparently. I knew the minute I saw George crunch down on one at Excel’s expo that the boys had it in the bag.

Markus’s performance this week was particularly impressive, as he quieted down and did a great job presenting TiVo to the seniors at the expo. Adam, sweetheart that he appears to be, was clearly having a blast shooting pictures of the old folks on a digital camera. Despite Clay’s momentary lapse of optimism for the TiVo idea, Team Excel worked together very well. Josh cracked me up when he described Clay as “the biggest bitch on this team.” Maybe so, but the guys still managed to pull off a great event at the retirement home.

There’s really no question as to who was the biggest bitch on the women’s team, which came as a disappointment to me, since I had high hopes for this person just a couple of weeks ago. Toral’s behavior this week was so offensive and over-the-top, I wondered if Omarosa was feeding her lines through an earpiece. Her comment regarding the other women’s lack of work experience was not only wrong (hello, Alla, Felisha, and Jennifer W. all have had as much or more time in the working world as she has), but conveniently ignored the fact that her best bud Rebecca is a mere 23 years old. Sorry, but how much experience can Rebecca possibly have one year out of college?

Numbers aside, I imagine that the women of Capital Edge practically fell off their sofas when they heard Toral say that she’d hire these “cute people” to do admin work for her. While Toral may have the ego necessary to run one of Trump’s companies, she certainly doesn’t have much common sense. Or the desire to do whatever it takes to win. She sucked when demonstrating various operating features on a big screen TV, making the excuse that, “I’m an investment banker on Wall Street. I put together multi million dollar deals and the TV, I wouldn’t say it’s below me, but it’s not something that I would generally do.” That kind of attitude has gotten several previous contestants fired, such as Erin last season in the Home Depot task and Stacy in season two’s dog grooming adventure. For as smart as Toral seems to think she is, she’s not very observant. And definitely not long for this game.

Neither is Rebecca. I admire the fact that she took on the role of project manager with her broken ankle, but she’d be wise not to ride that point too hard. Nor should she continue waxing platitudinal about her wonderful principles and integrity. Sure, she didn’t bring Toral back into the boardroom and she didn’t get fired, but Rebecca was treading on very dangerous ground with the Trumpmeister. Whom a PM brings back into the boardroom is probably more important than how he or she actually managed the entire task. Trump doesn’t like it when people demonstrate bad judgment in this area and often cans them. I was actually amazed that he didn’t give Rebecca the boot, but Jennifer W. served as a scapegoat with her poor cookie and cake selections for the expo. I can’t say that her dismissal was overly harsh, since anyone who puts out a cake declaring “Tethno Expo” probably isn’t sharp enough to be a CEO. Still, I felt a bit bad for her in the face of Rebecca’s gnashed fangs and bubbling venom in the boardroom. She’s a tough cookie, but I predict she’ll crumble sooner rather than later.