LAST EDITED ON 01-17-04 AT 05:13 PM (EST)

The Apprentice: The Ultimate Job Interview
Episode 1 – Official Summary
“Trumped Up”
by AyaK

{NOTE: Sorry about the delay in posting the summary; we just had a deal close today that took up my entire last two weeks.}

Welcome to Reality TV World for the start of our episode-by-episode summaries of NBC’s The Apprentice. In this show, sixteen supposedly-intelligent people have taken time off from their real lives to audition for a job with a “big salary” ($250,000/year – I guess that’s a big salary, but it’s only one-quarter of what a Survivor winner makes, and the Survivor winners also don’t have to put in a year of indentured servitude to a megalomaniac afterward) as the “president” of “one” of Donald Trump’s companies. For those of you fortunate enough to not know the guy, Donald Trump’s day job (when he’s not “acting”) is a real estate developer, and real estate developers own lots of shell companies with no employees and no net income that only serve to protect the developer from personal liability if a project tanks. The constant references to the winner becoming president of “one” of Trump’s companies leads me to believe that a new shell company must be in the works!

Although this is The Donald’s first starring role in a reality TV show, it could be argued that a couple have been based on his life. Let’s see, for starters there’s The Next Joe Millionaire, the show about the supposedly rich American being pursued and maybe caught by a bevy of foreign-born beauties. Trump’s first wife, Ivana, and current girlfriend, Melania, both would fit into the harem – although, to be honest, neither hold a candle to Joe’s Linda except in looks. When Trump’s affair with actress/model (and later, second wife) Marla Maples became fodder for the gossip columns during his marriage to Ivana, Trump must have felt like he was on Big Brother 4, trapped with both his current interest and his soon-to-be ex. Trump’s daughter Ivanka wouldn’t have seemed out of place if she pulled up a cow next to Paris Hilton and Nicole Richie on The Simple Life. And, of course, Matt Kennedy Gould in The Joe Schmo Show had a lot in common with almost everyone who has ever invested in one of Trump’s ventures – misled and taken for a fool.

The show itself has interesting angles (especially for those of us with advanced business degrees), but it’s really positioned as a “business lesson” from Donald Trump, coupled with a massive amount of ego-boosting self-promotion for The Donald. Whether Trump’s ego, which already threatens to dwarf Manhattan, needs any more inflating is questionable, but that’s where this show – a co-production of Mark Burnett Productions and Trump Productions, by the way – takes us. In fact, even without this show Trump may already be America’s foremost self-promoting egotist, since he always puts his own name on his investments (Trump Tower, Trump Taj Mahal Casino, Trump Air, Trump Ice – a brand of water, nothing more … coming soon, you garbage haulers, look for the Trump Dump – and then there’s the butt-reduction surgery that gives you the “Trump Rump” – the remaining opportunities for brand expansion are still limitless). Not even self-promoting mega-billionaires like Bill Gates (Microsoft), Richard Branson (Virgin), Steve Jobs (Apple, Pixar) or Larry Ellison (Oracle) do that – but then again, they can sell their track record of success to potential investors, while all Trump has to sell is the dubious “prestige” of being in a deal with The Donald.

In The Godfather Part II, one of the characters notes that the gangster Hyman Roth (based on real-life hood Meyer Lansky) was still around because he “always makes money for his partners.” Most real-life magnates, ranging from the great John D. Rockefeller (who made Cleveland into one of the wealthiest towns in the world in the 1890s because so many locals were invested in Standard Oil) to Gates (whose “Microsoft millionaires” are also legion), have done the same. By this standard, Trump is little more than a busted Hyman, because he is famous for NOT making money for his partners and investors. Anyone remember the USFL? The big-money contracts to Herschel Walker and Brian Sipe? If Trump ever sold an investment to the Mafia and then took them to the cleaners the way he normally does, he’d end up like Luca Brazzi, sleeping with the fishes in the East River. Indeed, Trump is the P.T. Barnum of American business – living proof that there’s a sucker born every minute. The Donald’s guiding business philosophy can be traced back to Ben Franklin: “A fool and his money are soon parted” ... and the Donald wants to make sure that he's the one who parts them. It’s hard to believe that he studied finance at the Wharton School, and harder to believe that, at his roots, The Donald is just a typical rich playboy who took over his daddy’s very successful business (The Trump Organization).

Trump is also a best-selling author. His The Art of the Deal was the textbook of arrogance and personal egotism for the yuppie-wannabes of the 1980s. Of course, his deals then crashed into flames, since he had decided to buy in at the high end of the real-estate market. But then, through retained rights that gave him the option to squeeze out the investors in his Atlantic City properties for pennies on the dollar (NOT through his negotiating skills, since lots of people in the investment world had recognized how one-sided the rights were in his deals long before the real-estate crash and subsequent events proved it), he avoided collapse and used the bargain properties to secure the loans provided by his new investors. As he is the first to proclaim, he’s the largest real-estate developer in New York City. But his real claim to fame is his ability to schmooze very rich individuals into continuing to indulge his self-aggrandizing projects. Learning about hunting for willing investors from Donald Trump would be like learning about hunting cobras from a mongoose. But hang on tightly to your wallet while you watch, lest you too be tempted to invest. Remember Kaa mesmerizing his prey in The Jungle Book?

Oh, and Trump is also a germophobe. He washes his hands constantly. He avoids physical contact. He carries handi-wipes in his pockets to disinfect himself after he shakes hands. Perhaps, after The Apprentice, he can do a guest appearance on Monk to compare quirks.

With that in mind, let’s turn to the show. It opens with Trump proclaiming New York City as “my city” and “the real jungle.” Hey, Woody Guthrie would have agreed. After all, as he wrote:

As through this world I’ve wandered,
I’ve seen lots of funny men.
Some will rob you with a six-gun,
And some with a fountain pen.
(copyright 1958, Sanga Music Inc., NYC)

New York City has both kinds. I’ll let you decide which one Trump is.

Throughout the show’s entire intro, Trump reads his lines in such a wooden manner that you begin to wonder if he’s really Pinocchio. Finally, he’s done, the opening credits (set to the O’Jays’ great Gamble-Huff tune “For The Love Of Money”) roll, and we can appreciate how good the septuagenarian Rudy Boesch was in his role of camp commander in Mark Burnett’s Combat Missions reading similarly canned lines.

Day One: Sour Suite

We meet the 16 contestants, whom we are repeatedly told were selected out of over 200,000 applicants, as they show up at Trump’s HQ in the Trump Tower.

About half of the contestants have business educations; the other half are entrepreneurs – or, perhaps, hustlers is more apt. Regardless of background, it seems that the main criterion for selection was an ego big enough to rival The Donald’s. Only two really stand out – Omarosa Manigault-Stallworth, a PhD candidate/political consultant who was a White House intern during the Clinton administration (think Monica Lewinsky) and clearly sees herself as the “queen bee” of the women, and Dr. David Gould, an MD-MBA (from NYU) who currently handles venture capital investing in medical technology. David is the anti-Trump – smart, well-educated, and in the business of making money for his investors, not taking their money for himself. There can be little doubt that David isn’t long for this show.

For those of you who want to know more about the contestants, here's the introduction for each of them:

Jessie Conners: from New Richmond, Wisconsin, 21, high-school education only, markets real estate, pictured on a farm with cows and horses, might want to take a roll in the hay.

Kwame Jackson: the token strong black male and token Harvard MBA, 29, former investment manager for a Wall St. firm, hopes to represent Harvard better than Nick did in Survivor: The Australian Outback and Linda did in Survivor: Africa ... more proof that Mark Burnett likes people of color with Harvard affiliations

Ereka Ventrini: from NYC, parents ran a neighborhood pizzeria, marketing manager for a cosmetics company but doesn't look like a walking advertisement for her product, ifyouknowwhatImean.

Troy McClain: from Boise, Idaho, shown on the bank of a stream as in A River Runs Through It -- perhaps he thinks he's Brad Pitt, HS grad only, takes care of mom and disabled sister, runs own linen company (no, that doesn't mean he makes linen clothes; it means he supplies and launders things like bedsheets for motels and tableclothes for restaurants -- think Mr. Bundles from Annie).

Amelia "Amy" Henry: from Austin, Texas, MBA, works in hi-tech, lost millions in unvested options when the "dot-bombs" crashed, shown working with her laptop on a park bench, tall and attractive -- she'd get a lot of attention working in the park...!

Bowie Hogg: another Texan, from Dallas, business degree, does sales for an express delivery company, built like a fireplug, talks with a rural drawl, must have been called "Boss Hogg" a lot as a kid -- and for good reason

Kristi Frank: from Santa Monica, California, like Mark Burnett's T-shirt company, former actress in racy pictures, co-owns a restaurant (1%?) and "investment properties", which could be anything, and she's not saying ... after all, in her kind of movies, the women don't say a lot of words ... all they need to do is moan

David and Omarosa ... and Omarosa introduces herself to Trump's assistant as Omarosa Stallworth, letting us know that the "Manigault" is simply an affectation, just like her photo in front of the White House -- she's the token black woman and also the token agitator, think Jerri Manthey in Survivor: The Australian Outback

Nick Warnock: the self-proclaimed "hardest working salesman in LA," a full-commission (no salary!) copier salesman ... and potential winner, from this intro, since he reminds me of Mark Burnett starting out

Katrina Campins: 23, self-proclaimed to be in the top 3% of realtors nationwide, pictured in front of an estate ... which she won't be living in as a result of her performance on this show

Sam Solovey: "director of business development for an Internet company that I co-founder" -- which might have been an impressive title five years ago

Heidi Bressler: from Philadelphia, shaves her eyebrows and then paints 'em on, like the silent movie actresses did, so she looks phonier than a three-dollar bill, senior account executive for a telecom (probably one of the ones in serious financial trouble -- WorldCom, say -- because anyone else would be afraid to hire her with those scary 'brows)

Bill Rancic: 32, Chicago, founder of the Smelly-Cigar-of-the-Month Club, would love a thaw in U.S.-Cuba relations

Jason Curis: 23, from Detroit, started real-estate development firm that controls 39 low-income units, can anyone say "government grant"?

Tammy Lee: from Seattle, stockbroker in Wall St. firm, claims not to care about impressing anyone but The Donald, "dolls up" before meeting him, succeeds in not impressing any member of viewing audience

Trump makes everyone wait in a room next to the boardroom. They don’t communicate at all while waiting. Very strange. They look like a bunch of wallflowers at a dance, studiously avoiding any contact with the people pressed in near them. It’s hard to believe that so many successful entrepreneurs wouldn’t be taking advantage of this time to build their list of contacts ... which leads you to question their claims of success. They look more like chumps. In fact, that’s the perfect name for the 16 of them: Trump’s Chumps.

Finally, The Donald lets the Chumps in and introduces them to his two henchmen, who will be helping him evaluate. One is George Ross, Trump’s in-house lawyer for the last 25 years; the other, Caroline Kepcher, the chief operating officer of “one” of his companies. Trump proudly announces that “Caroline is a killer. There are many men buried in her wake.” Right away, we understand why Caroline is so serious-looking: this analogy reveals that Trump is, in the language of the 1970s, a male chauvinist pig, who sees women as either tough-as-nails ball-busters (the way he sees Caroline) or bedroom playmates. Can a woman be both professional and feminine? The Donald says no. (Of course, we should remember that, when The Donald was starting out with daddy's company, he was famously admitted to an exclusive Manhattan club with the proviso that he'd stay away from the other members' wives -- no joke. It's hard to write funny material when The Donald's real life is funnier.)

The 16 contestants are broken down, Survivor-like, into two tribes corporations. Like Survivor: The Amazon, the tribes corporations are the 8 men versus the 8 women. The tribes corporations will have an immunity challenge a project every episode. The tribe corporation that wins the immunity challenge project will have immunity get a reward and not have to go to tribal council the boardroom for an elimination ceremony. After each challenge project, a member of the losing tribe corporation will be voted off fired by Trump. Before the vote termination, the losing tribe corporation will get a chance to review its “failure” in the challenge project. During this review, questions will be asked of the tribemates employees by show host Jeff Probst Donald Trump. The person voted out fired will be asked to leave the island Trump Tower immediately – or, as Trump robotically puts it, it’s “the suite or the street.”

He still sounds like he’s reading every word. I keep looking for the teleprompter. And that comb-over … yeech! The Donald must be a member of the Hair Club for Men.

The teams are then dismissed to their suite in the Trump Tower. They walk away amazed at the creative genius that was involved in dreaming up these completely original, not-at-all derivative rules. (In fact, the only new element is that each team will choose a project leader for each project. The losing project leader and two members of the team, chosen by the project leader, will be the only three candidates for dismissal.)

The teams are treated to a caviar-and-champagne brunch in the suite (which has, among other amenities, two treadmills). As the tribes corporations mingle, we get a close look at the type of people that Mark Burnett felt would appeal to TV viewers. In particular, we meet Sam, who wants nothing more than to stalk The Donald. Sam and David talk, and Sam is horrified that David could spend so much time in university to get TWO post-graduate degrees. He concludes that David must be lazy – proving that he had no idea of what is required for a venture capitalist to decide which new medical patent or technology to back and which to avoid. Maybe Sam thinks that the VCs (that’s venture capitalists, not Viet Cong, although when they’re shooting at you, it’s hard to tell the difference sometimes) should just flip a coin for their investments … or else invest in someone like himself, a pure huckster type.

Compared to Sam, Howard Dean seems stable.

Soon, the tribes corporations are given instructions to split up into two sides and choose their tribal corporate names. The men fairly quickly settle on VersaCorp, playing off the idea that they are versatile because of their mix of skills. Yeah, they can switch from buddy-buddy to backstabbers in nothing flat.

The women, meanwhile, get into a fight, especially after Omarosa keeps trying to boss the group into something similar to her choice, Donald’s Darlings. Uh, that might be a good name for Trump’s personal harem (a group that Omarosa and Tammy would like to join), but it doesn’t seem like a very good corporate name for women outside the sex trades. Finally, the women break up their meeting to reflect and – after three hours of fruitless discussions – Ereka approaches people individually with her suggestion, Protégé Corporation. Even Omarosa, who appeared to be trying to decide (in the best tradition of former White House interns) which thong to flash The Donald with, can see this is a great name for a group of people who want to be Donald Trump’s meek apprentice and learn the fine art of bleeding investors dry.

One team opts to stress its professional skills. The other opts to stress its dependence on The Donald. Can we guess which gender is which? Don’t look for a feminist breakthrough from this crew.

The teams then get a call from Trump’s secretary to meet him on the floor of the New York Stock Exchange at 5:45 AM the next day (apparently, Mark Burnett wanted to film in the NYSE, but he could only have the podium in the wee hours of the morning). The women meditate. A pleasant change from the earlier catfight. The men debate the dress code on the floor of the Exchange. As if they’ll get to stay there….

Day Two: Squeeze My Lemon, Baby

On the podium of the NYSE as the tribes corporations arrive are Donald Trump and his lieutenants George of the Urban Jungle and Caroline the Killer. Wait, is this Cupid, Part 2?

Trump asks each corporation (wouldn’t they be better described as general partnerships or limited liability companies, since they don’t have centralized management?) for its name. As the women suspected, he likes the name Protégé better. Another stroke to The Donald’s ego – these beautiful young women want to learn from him! So what if they don’t really want to learn what he wants to teach them ….

Project leaders for this first task are Troy for the men and Ereka for the women, as a reward for coming up with Protégé. Trump gives the corporations their “back-to-basics” assignment: sell lemonade in Manhattan for the day. Each corporation gets $250 “seed money” to buy supplies; whoever earns the most money by 7:30 PM wins.

OK, task 1 is sheer hucksterism. You wouldn’t guess that a former street T-shirt vendor (Mark Burnett) thought this one up, would you?

In an insert, The Donald tells us that he thinks location is overrated, and that a smart person in a bad location will do better than an idiot in a good location. Aha, so that’s why so many of Trump’s ventures run into financial difficulties despite being in prime locations!

VersaCorp approaches the project professionally. Troy takes charge and runs the show. The guy’s actually a good leader. He delegates the task of where to locate the selling operations to Kwame, the Harvard MBA grad, who chooses the Fulton Fish Market on the grounds that there will be plenty of foot traffic there on a beautiful day. The men set out.

Meanwhile, Protégé huddles in disarray. Omarosa tries to take over. Project leader Ereka objects. Omarosa says Ereka’s too emotional. Tammy says that they don’t need a table to sell lemonade. Ereka agrees and says that she’d rather invest in the product. The whole thing resembles a K-Mart strategy session. “We need to compete with Wal-Mart and lower prices!” “We need to compete with Target and raise quality!” “We need to compete with Woolworth’s and expand into a lot of peripheral businesses!” “OK, let’s do all three!” End result: negative cash flow and a quick trip into Chapter 11 bankruptcy.

VersaCorp arrives at the fish market. Kwame picks a site. Then he pulls the single biggest coup of the entire event, as he convinces a local store owner to give them a table, a cart, cups and ice in return for their directing people into his store. The men buy batches of CountryTime lemonade mix and start making product. Caroline the Killer watches. All the men sell their professional-looking product for the reasonable price of $1/cup. Troy continues to play the role of decisive, supportive leader.

In a repeat of the prior night, the women have argued for an hour but still haven’t reached any decision. Finally, Amy and Kristi take matters into their own hands and head off to buy supplies. Hey, a rational decision! After they leave, New Yorker Ereka finally decides on a sales location – Rockefeller Center. Unfortunately, their cell phones don’t work among the skyscrapers, and Ereka can’t reach Kristi and Amy to give them the rendezvous point. Oh, and Ereka gets lost on her way to Rockefeller Center. By now, the women are in such disarray that they resemble The Trump Organization.

Amy and Kristi buy frozen lemonade mix and, unable to contact the rest of the team, finally decide to mix it in what looks like a scrub bucket that was left over after someone mopped up the filth of the NYC subways. Fortunately for them, the Health Department doesn’t show up, and so they start selling their amateurish product. Considering that Amy and Kristi could pass for actresses (in fact, Kristi was an actress – although not in the kind of movies that she’d want to put on her resume … unless she was Paris Hilton) and, since they were being filmed, onlookers might have thought that they were actresses, they actually have some luck selling this product at a higher price -- $2/cup. Ereka finally gets through to them and tells them to take a cab to Rockefeller Center. They explain that they have too much stuff to do so. So Ereka leads her tribe of nomads to go join them. Finally, all of Protégé is helping with the sales effort.

But not for long. Tammy is tired. Her feet hurt from her decision to wear very high-heeled shoes. This whole exercise isn’t getting her one inch closer to sharing The Donald’s bed. So she decides to take a lunch break. By herself. Without telling the others. Why do the names Debb Eaton and Kel Gleason start running through my mind? Self-appointed team dictator Omarosa decides to take Tammy along on a trip to the store to get more supplies, so that she can get Tammy to behave and show the others what a good leader she is. Instead, upon their return, Tammy confronts the rest of the team about their dissatisfaction, based on what Omarosa just told her – thus both further isolating herself and undercutting Omarosa’s claim to a leadership role. Way to go, Tammy!

The men are starting to struggle with the rejection of their product. David chases after some bike riders and starts harassing them when they don’t bite on his sales pitch. Yeah, insulting potential customers is always a great way to make sales. The men note that foot traffic is low, and it looks like any lunch rush is over, so they decide to move. From the “TRUMP as in rump” helicopter, The Donald makes an inane comment about the men stupidly trying to sell lemonade near the stinky fish market. Of course, since I have so little respect for The Donald, I’ll point out what he missed – the obvious: Why would TOURISTS be coming to the Fulton Fish Market? The market draws a lot of people … but they’re locals, AFTER WORK, buying food. During the day, it’s deader than dead. But, as Trump so loudly proclaimed back at the start, location doesn’t matter, right? Nevertheless, the men decide to move. (Hey, why not go back to the Stock Exchange and sell lemonade to all the traders leaving work? Naah, too obvious.)

By contrast, the women are looking to sell sex, led by Kristi, who flirts shamelessly and offers to sell lemonade and her phone number for $5/glass. It works. Kisses become a part of the sales offering. Amy shows some skin. A passing customer says that he’d never pay $5 for a glass of lemonade, but $5 for a glass of lemonade and a kiss from a pretty young girl could be justified: $1 for the lemonade and $4 for the girl. We see the women make $50 from a group of guys, and it wasn’t for that tasty industrial waste lemonade either. Wonder if there was any lemon-squeezing going on off-camera.

Among the men, Sam is worried. He feels that the men aren’t being creative enough in their selling techniques. He’s certain that the women are having an easier time selling lemonade than the men are, and that they’re getting more money per glass (right on both counts, although he doesn’t know it). To compensate, he tries to recruit an attractive woman to sell lemonade in his place. When this doesn’t help, he then goes for the grand slam home run – he tries to sell a cup of lemonade for $1,000. It’s a great sales pitch: whoever goes for it would have a great story to tell and would probably be featured on the TV show, too. Isn’t air time on a prime-time TV show worth $1,000, even if the lemonade isn’t?

Sam tells his potential customers that a $1,000 cup of lemonade is the personification of the American Dream. I’ve gotta admit, I love this strategy. Heck, Sam reminds me a lot of The Donald himself, right down to the oversized ego (describing his own strategy: “That is a killer thing to do.”). But all megalomania aside, this is a truly perceptive strategy for this project – look for an “angel” investor to supply your cash. Naturally, angels are hard to come by, and they take time to cultivate, but you only need one. But it doesn’t work on the first try, and Sam gets berated by Troy and Caroline the Killer for spending 20 minutes trying to sell one cup of lemonade. I keep waiting for these guys to realize that he might be on to something, especially Caroline the Killer, but no luck. Hey, the game isn’t to see how many cups you can sell, and selling a few cups at $20 or $50 … or even, better yet, $1,000 … will make up for the limited appeal of your product, which its slick packaging can’t obscure. After all, as Abe Lincoln said, you can fool some of the people all of the time, and you can fool all of the people some of the time. Sam only needs to find one he can fool, and his team is home free. But, instead, VersaCorp abandons the strategy and continues to opt for straight sales. We see lots of people walk past.

At the end of the day, the men celebrate – they more than doubled their $250 initial stake. They’re convinced that they’re going to be victorious. Of course, we don’t see the women. Just as well, since Kristi may have crossed the PG-13 line in her attempt to bring in more cash. As Larry Flynt and Hugh Hefner have proven, sex sells.

Day 3: Presidents, Kings and Nubile Young Women

At 9 AM, the tribes corporations meet in the boardroom for the post-mortem on the project. Caroline the Killer says that the men were well-organized and doubled their money. George of the Urban Jungle says that the women were disorganized at the start but ultimately quadrupled their money. Protégé whoops in triumph. Trump rubs it in to the men: “They killed you!” VersaCorp looks crushed. Trump tells the women that he’ll give them a tour of “the nicest apartment in New York” -- his -- so that they can see what it looks like if you succeed the way he has. Probably Ken Lay, Jeff Skilling and Dennis Koslowski used to give similar tours, with similar brash statements.

Trump’s apartment is clearly designed to impress potential investors. Humans do not live in places that look like this; the gloss shining off all the metal would kill them. And what kind of person would want an honest-to-goodness indoor “fountain wall”? The women, however, react just the way that the women in Joe Millionaire react. The Donald’s girlfriend Melania makes sure to greet the women before The Donald arrives. Apparently she wants to scope them out, to see if any of them threaten her position as the still-uncrowned queen of The Donald’s affections. And well she should be careful, considering that such corporate tycoons as Bill Agee (Bendix, Morrison Knudsen) and Jack Welch (GE) went ga-ga over smart younger women (Harvard MBAs Mary Cunningham and Suzy Wetlaufer, respectively). Though, as she should remember, both Bill Agee and Jack Welch made money for their investors, so their comfort level with smart women may be higher. (And, just in case you’re wondering, neither I nor any member of my family has ever invested in a Donald Trump project, so I’m not commenting from any personal bitterness. I also didn’t invest in Enron or Tyco, but I admit to having owned some WorldCom, so I’m not altogether unfamiliar with the feelings of a duped investor.)

Trump, meanwhile, continues to show his out-of-control ego, noting that “I show this apartment to very few people. Presidents. Kings.” Yeah, Donald, gotta make sure that those potential investors keep thinking that they’re getting a rare treat when you show them around. I’ll bet the entire apartment and all the fancy furnishings belong to “one of my corporations” and are depreciated as a business expense. Too bad that the corporation didn’t also spring for an interior decorator with good taste – the apartment looks like it was decorated by Charles Foster Kane.

VersaCorp is nervously awaiting its meeting with The Donald. Troy says that, as the leader, some of the responsibility for their loss is his. Sam, who knows that he’s not the most popular guy in the corporation, asks for everyone to say something positive before making any criticism. David says, in one of those kiss-of-death confessionals that Mark Burnett loves to use, that he’s not at all nervous about the upcoming discussion and that he thinks it will be “interesting.” Well, to be honest, David is wasting his time in this group, so I won’t be sad to see him go. He’ll have a much more interesting career as a VC than he ever would have had as a huckster.

In a series of confessionals, Sam discusses his own nervousness and his thoughts on the night’s upcoming vote firing. He thinks David should be the one to go. After all, someone who’s spent so much time in university must not want to work, right? My only hope is that Sam gets really sick somewhere where there isn’t anyone except for a few peasants to treat him (“Should we use the leeches to suck the bad spirits out of his body?”), or that he has a huge legal problem and decides to represent himself.

And so, on to the boardroom, where Trump, George of the Urban Jungle and Caroline the Killer are waiting for the chumps. George says that The Donald doesn’t want to work with an idiot. Why not, since he works with himself every day? The Donald proves his obliviousness, since he asks a question that can’t be answered intelligently: would things have been different if you had been the project leader? The only honest answer is “Yes, but whether they would have been better or worse, I don’t know.” David answers “No,” stating that selling isn’t his forte. Like we didn’t already know that from seeing him harass the bike riders. Sam says that Troy lacks listening skills – actually true, since Troy should have listened more to Sam’s dissenting opinion about the sales strategy once it was failing, even if the messenger of that opinion was someone as unsavory as Sam. Jason also argues that Troy should have listened more … and gets rebuked by Trump, who says that a leader has to act. Wow, stop the presses – The Donald isn’t completely clueless; he’s actually right for once! (I’ll ignore The Donald’s subsequent juvenile outburst toward Jason over Jason’s attempt to interrupt The Donald’s interruption of his answer. I’m sure The Donald thought that he was teaching Jason a real business lesson … but then again, he probably thinks his comb-over looks good. All it revealed was that The Donald wants to make sure that everyone kowtows to him.)

George of the Urban Jungle says that Troy delegated responsibility, such as the choice of location, and when you delegate, you’re taking the risk that the person you delegated the job to doesn't do a good job of it. Caroline notes, correctly, that Troy backed up Kwame’s location decision but didn’t back up Sam’s sales ideas. She fails to point out that she encouraged him to disregard Sam's efforts. Uh, passing the buck is unbecoming in a COO, Caroline.

Trump asks each of the chumps which one of the other chumps would make the worst leader. Sam says David; everyone else says Sam. David says that Sam went over the line, and the others agree. At this point, Sam starts into a long, semi-coherent ramble about how he could follow the rules if he was head of one of the Trump companies, and how he’d follow the values that he inherited from his parents, the same way that The Donald inherited values from his parents Fred Trump and Mary Trump – proving that Sam actually made the effort to learn something about The Donald before coming to NYC. Suddenly a loud sucking noise filled the boardroom -– the sound of a professional suck-up at work.

Project leader Troy is asked to name the other two chumps who should face elimination. He picks Sam and David. The remaining five chumps get to go back to the hotel suite. The three candidates to leave have to wait outside while Trump and his cronies (let’s call them the “firing squad”) debate their fate.

Outside the boardroom, Sam continues his disjointed behavior. He re-enacts the rise of man from crawling to walking hunched over to walking erect and describes that as the comeback that he’s going to make in this game. He tells David that there is no way David will win. Inside the boardroom, Caroline trashes Troy’s leadership by repeating the same point she made earlier, while George backs Troy and compares David and Sam, noting that Sam is more of a risk-taker – like Trump himself (hey, didn’t someone else already say that?) – but he’s also a loose cannon (to be sure, also like Trump). Caroline the Killer calls David a liar for saying (along with everyone else, mind you) that Sam crossed the line during the project. I guess her method of killing is via a quick, silent knife in the back.

With the three chumps back inside, The Donald asks Troy why he chose David and Sam to face firing. Troy says that it’s because David would make a good right-hand man, but he’s not a leader, while Sam is a maverick. Trump then asks Troy if he’d trust Sam with his bank account. Troy says no. Sam claims that this means Troy thinks he’s dishonest, and he’s not dishonest. David says, in what might be the best unscripted line of the night, “The concern might not be a lack of honesty as much as a lack of discretion.” On that note, The Donald is ready to render his verdict. Troy, he says, has potential. When he turns to Sam, Sam stands up. I guess that might be appropriate for someone facing the firing squad, and I expect him to ask for a blindfold and a cigarette next, but Trump tells him to sit down. Trump says that Sam may be either a great success or a total disaster, but he isn’t sure yet, so he’s keeping him. (In fact, Sam could easily be both – just like his potential boss-to-be.) Which leaves David, who walks the plank for “failing to impress” The Donald and for admitting that he wouldn’t have done better as a leader than Troy did. David has reason to feel like a big winner: he’s free!

Revised prizes for The Apprentice: first place, one year as president of one of The Donald’s companies at a “big salary”; second place, two years as president of one of The Donald’s companies at a “big salary.”

Sam bows to the firing squad as he leaves. On their way back to the suite, Sam and Troy shake hands. On the street, David says that he has the highest IQ of all of the 16, and all this proves is that he was the weakest link at selling lemonade. This statement strikes me as wrong-headed in so many ways that I’m not sure where to start. First, David – you’re the weakest link at selling anything. Second, people who brag about their big brains usually get chopped down at the knees by other people of similar intelligence who have enough sense to keep their mouths shut. And finally, going on this show – a show that requires you to impress Donald Trump – makes you a Chump, no matter what your IQ is. Stick to VC work, back the next breakthrough drug, and then laugh in The Donald’s face – that’s the best revenge.

Next week on The Apprentice – let’s go to the airport! Since the voice-over tells us that there is a surprising outcome, look for VersaCorp to end up back at tribal council in the boardroom (Note: That’s just a guess). And in a later episode, look for NBC cross-promotion, featuring late-night host Carson Daly. Ugh. Guess they wanted to make The Donald look good by comparison.

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