Celebrity Apprentice, the Kinda One-Third(ish) of the Way Performance Reviews: The Business of Celebrity Business is Celebrity

Lennox: Perhaps fittingly, you’re playing the role of the good soldier right now. You always make an impact (heh), everyone likes you because you’ve got golden charisma just oozing out of you, and you do a good job.

The problem, of course, is leadership. The first time you are Project Manager will tell the tale of whether you are a true contender (seriously, I’m not doing the puns on purpose) or not. I just have this bad feeling that your first stint as PM will be hijacked by Stephen but you’ll get the blame and be sent packing.

And speaking of blame, what kind of idiot is Trump for chastising Lennox for overexposing his celebrity? I mean, how do you overexpose someone with that charisma? How many commercials was Mr. Whipple in? Over 500, according to wikipedia. The Trix rabbit has been around since 1969. And what about the Verizon guy? Charlie Tuna? Madge the Manicurist? The “Time to make the donuts” guy? There are dozens more examples, but the point is, if you have a successful spokesperson, you use them. Not to mention that whoever pointed it out was right – each client was new and had no idea that Lennox had been used before. Once again, what works in this game doesn’t have to work in real life – as David Bloomberg has pointed out, this game encourages short-term thinking.

Besides, I’d take a lot more stock in that advice if it didn’t come from a man that didn’t brand his own name on everything short of sex toys. At least, I hope he’s stopped there.

Trace: I started to make a joke about how your name is appropriate, seeing as we’ve only seen small traces of you, but thought that was too dumb even for me.

You are also a great marketer and a “go to” guy. Your contributions have been nothing short of brilliant and I commend you for them. Plus, you’re a damn good singer with a killer voice – you could sing the phone book and every woman in earshot would swoon. My advice to you is the same as to Lennox, that you need to stand out to win, and my fear about your first run as PM is the same. I also advise you to find a way to use that voice to your advantage, especially singing. If Lennox is the face of Hydra, Trace should ALWAYS be the voice.

Empresario:

Ranks among the worst names ever. I’m not sure if it’s supposed to be a play on “impress” or “empress” or what, but it says nothing while sounding weak. And would it be wrong of me to point out that the only challenge the women won regarded shoes?

Carol: You’re a good soldier and, Vinnie mole issues aside, seemed to come through when it counted as PM. I never doubted that you have a good head on your shoulders, as everything I’ve ever heard about you has been positive. Besides, I doubt you could have survived this long in the modeling world, much less been such a pioneer, if you were a nitwit.

I actually didn’t like the Croc-shaped box, the fact that I despise Crocs having nothing to do with it. I thought it was unwieldy and didn’t focus enough on the issue at hand, which was the charity. It looked like a fancy holder for the Croc version of Imelda Marcos – like the giant Darth Vader head-shaped storage box I had for my Star Wars figures all those years ago.

OK, so maybe it wasn’t that long ago.

Fine. They’re in my closet about five feet away. Happy?

In any case, Carol, from what I’ve seen you have an excellent chance to win this game. The best chance of any of the women, actually. You’ve made no enemies (no legitimate ones – I’m looking at you, Omarosa) and have done a fine job as both soldier and leader. For you to be fired will take a major-league meltdown on your part. We’ve seen how one bad decision can lead to a firing on this show, and I hope that doesn’t happen to you.

If I had to bet, I’d go with you and Lennox as the final two.

Nely: You’re a joke. Remember Ivana from season two, who should have been fired in week two and was saved by Bradford stupidly giving up his immunity? Then she embarrassed herself and the next ten generations of her family by stripping off her skirt to sell a candy bar. Both Hall of Shame moments, as the links illustrate.

This is going to happen again. You should have been fired both in weeks two and three and were saved both times by the stupidity of your team. You’ve already embarrassed yourself numerous times by showing a cluelessness (hats? REALLY? HATS?) and naiveté (breathing exercises?) that no businessperson, much less an executive, should have. Not to mention that you seem constantly starstruck. I don’t know if you have a boss to report to, but if I were your boss, I’d be eliminating all proof that I ever knew you.

What have you done wrong? Let’s see. In week two, you underutilized Nadia and then blamed her for your failure to deliver a strong concept and manage the project in a timely manner. You failed in your line of expertise! Miserably! You should have been fired in week two, but Nadia had no backbone to defend herself.

Then, at the beginning of episode three, you were sobbing uncontrollably, complaining about how hard the boardroom was. You built Telemundo more or less from the ground up, helped launch HBO Ole, and this boardroom brought you to tears? How is this possible? It’s like Joe Buck being nervous about describing his son’s little league game. Could it be, like Ivana’s “oh God,” you realized that you should have been gone instead?

Later, you fawned all over Gene Simmons like a schoolgirl. Women seem to do this for some reason and I’ll never understand why, so I’ll cut you some slack on this one. You completely blew the meeting with the Kodak people, and I’m willing to bet that they blamed Gene’s ignoring the business plan to you not being able to shut up. Again, you’ve done this before, how could it be so difficult? I don’t get it.

Basically, extending the Ivana comparison, the only way you didn’t go home in week three was Gene falling on his sword (more on that later). Trump was practically BEGGING Gene to let him fire you (and I don’t know why he just didn’t do it, as he’s done it before) and Gene let you off the hook – and the worst part is, you didn’t even seem to figure that out.

In week four, you lost your team the task when your contacts did not come through in time with their money. I don’t really blame you for this, but had the money come in, you would have won. Marilu should have thrown you under the bus but once again, you were saved because the focus was on another teammate, Jennie – a firing that could be justified, sure, but not over someone who screwed up royally three weeks in a row!

There is no advice I can give you short of pulling some miraculous project-saving idea out of your ass and making people forget the last few weeks, and frankly, I don’t think you have that in you.