Welcome to the fifty-ninth season of Celebrity Apprentice, where money is no objec—oh whoops! Looks like budgets have been slashed because Donald Trump, the man of a million hair follicles, pulls up to Lincoln Center in a limousine instead of a helicopter. A limousine? How nouveau riche! He greets the eighteen “celebrities” on the stage of Avery Fischer Hall while a live orchestra plays his theme song in the background. Our eighteen “celebrities” are as follows:
Adam Carolla: Most famous for being the foul-mouthed half of Loveline, and recently for ranting about those lazy, good-for-nothing Occupy protesters.
Arsenio Hall: The Arsenio Hall Show, and acting alongside Eddie Murphy.
Aubrey O’Day: Something in theater, and she claims to be a pop star.
Cheryl Tiegs: Supermodel and designer of fashions for Sears.
Clay Aiken: Weird looking kid who lost American Idol a decade ago.
Dayana Mendoza: Miss Universe 2008, which means Trump owns her ass.
Debbie Gibson: Teen star of the late 80s, famous for her album Electric Youth and posing in the March 2005 issue of Playboy (thank you, Wikipedia). Goes by the nickname “Tiffany.”
Dee Snider: Lead singer of Twisted Sister and radio show host.
George Takei: Sulu! Also, winner of an award for Most Awesome Use of Social Networking By A Senior Citizen.
Lisa Lampanelli: Stand up comic with a potty mouth, known as the Queen of Mean.
Lou Ferrigno: The Incredible Hulk.
Michael Andretti: Son of racing legend Mario Andretti, also races cars.
Patricia Velasquez: The first Latina supermodel.
Paul Teutul Sr.: Owner of Orange County Choppers, and Worst Father In The World.
Penn Jillette: The noisy half of Penn & Teller.
Teresa Giudice: The Real Housewife of New Jersey who yelled Prostitution whore!
Tia Carrere: “She can also be seen in Wild Cherry with Rumer Willis and Kristin Cavallari and Hard Breakers with Tom Arnold, Chris Kattan and Sophie Monk,” pretty much sums up her acting career.
Victoria Gotti: Famous for being in a mobbed up family, but I’m sure she has nothing to do with any of that, and her sons are lovely, upstanding citizens.
Okay, now that the introductions are over with, here are my first impressions: Clay Aiken has had a ridiculous amount of plastic surgery. He looks like a 43-year-old housewife from St. Louis who got all dolled up for a trip to the Mall of America where her oldest daughter, Kirsten, is auditioning for American Idol. Queen Of Mean Lisa Lampanelli is awesome, and Adam Carrola’s attempts to out-funny her are falling flat and oh! Trump just cut him off. When Victoria Gotti talks, stereotypical Italian accordion music plays in the background. Very class, Trump. Everyone is vying for attention from the first second, except for Paul Teutel, Sr., who is still trying to figure out why he’s even there.
In a big shocker, Trump divides the teams up by gender and tells them to pick a Project Manager and come up with a team name. Carolla tries to name the men’s team Crasstalk! Okay, The Honey Badgers, but still. Same thing. Penn Jillette suggests Enterprise, which is kind of funny since George Takei is sitting right there. Somehow the men come up with Unanimous, which is both weak and weird. The women aren’t doing much better, until Lisa brings them back into focus and they settle on Forte, which I guess is good enough.
Paul Sr., who had remained completely silent, steps up to be the Project Manager for an unknown task. The men are already planning how they can blame it on Paul Sr. when they lose. Patricia Velasquez, the first Latina supermodel, volunteers to be the PM for the women’s team.
We learn that Michael Andretti (who I will call Speedracer Jr.) isn’t there because a friend of his died in a racing accident, so his father, Mario Andretti (Speedracer Sr.) will be stepping in to take his place. We also learn that their task is to sell sandwiches.
The men decided to go for a carnival theme, with Lou Ferrigno flexing his Incredible Hulk muscles and Penn acting as a carnival barker. Paul Sr. says that he can probably bring in half a million bucks on this task. I’m not sure who he’s going to call, and he insinuates that he might have to clear out his own bank account. That’s not really how it works? But okay? When Trump’s daughter shows up to assess the men’s team, Paul Sr. is already thinking that half a million dollars may not be realistic given the time frame, but he nonetheless exudes confidence, or as much confidence as a senior citizen in a muscle shirt can. She is impressed.
Somehow, the women also came up with a carnival theme, but thankfully changed it to a red carpet idea. Gotti’s being a contrarian, but Lisa tells us that she won’t mess with Gotti because duh, she’s mobbed up. Lisa is thus far the brightest bulb on her team.
Patricia has the women hit the phones hard to dig up donations. Somehow this translates to Cheryl Tiegs admitting that she’s saving big donors for herself, and Gotti conducing “family business.” The next morning, Gotti doesn’t even show up for the task, leaving the rest of the women to turn a glorified bodega into a VIP red carpet event, if such events were held at Café Metro in midtown. Gotti eventually shows up and announces, “We had an accident,” and we all assume it means someone got whacked. No, she supposedly tore the cornea in her eye. Right. Yet she’s wearing more eye makeup than the entire cast of RuPaul’s Drag Race.
Over at the men’s café, The Hulk takes his shirt off and puts on a muscle shirt to prep for the task, along with Paul Sr. whose guns are pretty huge for an old guy. Then the entire cast of Orange County Choppers rolls up on, Penn Teller juggles fire, Dee Snyder wanders around aimlessly, and…nobody seems interested in going inside the café because all of the action is outside. Idiots.
The women, on the other hand, post a couple of pretty ladies out front who lure customers inside with their natural charms. Wyclef Jean shows up. You might remember him from Celebrity Charity Scandals such as Yele Haiti. He starts “jamming” with Tiffany, then some woman I’ve never heard of named Aubrey O’Day whines that she’s an even bigger pop star, rips the microphone out of Tiffany’s hands, and mistakes a charity event Battle of the Bands. Ladies! Focus!
Oh how awkward, some women just “made it rain” on Mrs. Aiken. It was as squicky as it sounds.
The women were bringing in some big bucks, tens of thousands of dollars per sandwich. Andy Cohen showed up, someone with the last name Ford bought a twenty five thousand dollar sandwich, Russell Simmons walked in and demanded a vegan sandwich. “For ten grand, I should have a sandwich I like.” Oh for crap’s sake, it’s for charity! Give the nice lady her money and have your assistant pick you up a vegan sandwich down the block.
Trump’s son arrives to check in on Forte, and he is impressed with everything except the grilled cheese. Meanwhile, over at Unanimous (a/k/a The Worst Team Name Ever), the restaurant is empty. Then, The Donald Himself calls the PMs and instructs them to bring their best sandwich to the Rachel Ray show. Whichever team has the best sandwich gets $35,000 for their charity. Rachel Ray makes my skin crawl, so I’m just going to skip over the details and tell you that America’s Most Irritating Food Television Personality preferred the men’s sandwich.
At the boardroom, Patricia decides that some woman named Dayana Mendoza, Miss Universe Of Trumpville 2008, is their star player. She feels the weakest links are Cheryl Tiegs and Victoria Gotti. I think I may have heard Lisa say a little prayer for Patricia.
Paul Sr. claims that he doesn’t have any weak players, but then coughs up Takei and Arsenio. He feels that Takei is a “meek person.” Trump calls bullshit, and Takei explains that he has spent his life fighting and overcoming obstacles. Arsenio gives Paul Sr. some decent side-eye, and Sr. explains that Arsenio was a random choice.
Turns out, the women only raised $126,000 whereas the men raised over $332,000 (plus the $35,000 from the winning sandwich), so Unanimous won the task. Paul Sr. explains that he raised $305,000 from one unnamed person, who I am going to assume is Paul Teutel, Sr. All of the money raised goes to Paul Sr.’s charity, Make-A-Wish Foundation. The men go up to the suite to drink champagne, and the women stay behind to face The Trump Family Firing Squad.
The women all pretty much single out Cheryl Tiegs and Victoria Gotti as the worst players on the task. Patricia brings them both back to the boardroom. There’s a lot of blah blah blah, Cherly’s scattered, Victoria showed up late, and Cheryl ultimately says, “I don’t know if this is right for me.” That’s enough for Trump.
Cheryl Tiegs, you’re fired.
Photo: NBC
