The Apprentice
News (Page 4)

Here's a scary tag team: Vince McMahon and Donale Trump will team up on this week's edition of Celebrity Apprentice.

The WWE Chairman and billionaire boss actually have a fake rivalry: they each chose competitors to represent them and do battle at Wrestlemania 23. It ended with McMahon, due to an earlier bet, having to shave his head when his wrestler lost.

"I invited Vince to come on because I loved my victory over him at WrestleMania 23, and I thought maybe I'd take it to the next step," Trump said. "Vince is the greatest showman there is. Whether you like him or not, Vince is a smart guy. He's cunning, he's sharp and I did listen to his opinions."

Here's a shock: Donald Trump says the celebrity edition of The Apprentice is the best yet, as he had to accept far fewer stars than even applied for his show.

"I think it's important to say for every person we took on, we turned down five. I never knew there were so many celebrities, to be honest with you," Trump told reporters during a recent conference call.

In the end, 14 D-List celebrities were accepted for The Apprentice's seventh season, which is scheduled to premiere Thursday, January 3 on NBC.

"What really surprised me was the fact that I wasn't exactly sure what I was getting. These are people that are successful celebrities, some unbelievably successful," said Trump. "And we've really had an amazing crop of people. I didn't know whether or not they were going to take it that seriously.

I didn't know whether or not they were going to be as competitive as kids getting out of Harvard and Yale, and Wharton, and all the different schools who, you know, were fighting for their lives. It turned out to be, I think, the best Apprentice we've done and that includes Apprentice Number One which actually became, for many weeks, the number one show on television.

"I really, in some cases in particular, had a hard time firing some of these people because I've known them not necessarily personally, but I've known their achievements," continued Trump.

"It's much more difficult. And that was, to me, the biggest difference between this and firing some young kid from Harvard who did a bad job. That was not hard for me, but firing somebody that I, in many ways, grew up with or watched over the last 25 years or 5 years or 2 years, was much more difficult because they're people of great achievement.

And it's hard for me to fire people of great achievement. But they deserved it and they got fired."

Jenn Hoffman is an alumni of The Apprentice.

And Donald Trump would be proud of how straightforward his former protege is being when it comes to the integrity of his show, along with reality TV in general.

Following Lauren Conrad's admission that parts of The Hills are - shocking horror! - staged, Hoffman wrote the following letter to Perez Hilton.

"Hi Perez,
I can't believe Lauren Conrad is trying to lead the public to believe all reality shows are staged. Her life must really be boring if the producers have to make so much stuff up. I was on the latest season of The Apprentice (a show about "boring" business people â€" not even supposed California socialites experiencing the high life) and I can tell you that every single thing on my show was real.

No scripts, no re-shoots for "continuity" and certainly no fake characters like you say they introduce on The Hills. Obviously some of the dating shows on tv are bullshitty and a bit put onâ€" but they make it pretty obvious. The Hills is filmed documentary style and presented as "reality." LC should just suck it up and admit she is a faker. Would anyone really be surprised or upset?

The Apprentice is real. Reality shows are real. It's just Lauren Conrad's show that apparently is fake."

Jenn Hoffman, MBA
The Apprentice Los Angeles
www.jennhoffman.com

The Scoop's Take: Can't we all just love The Hills for the semi-real, mostly-imaginary world that it is? If your show was so legitimate, Ms. Hoffman, and you're therefore such a serious businesswoman... why are you emailing Perez Hilton?

We hate to break it to you, but The Apprentice already has an attention-whore posing as a real businesswoman. Her name is Omarosa.

Donald Trump is turning The Apprentice into The Surreal Life.

Here is the cast of quasi-celebrities he has lined up for the next season of the reality series:

• Trace Adkins (country music singer)
• Carol Alt (model/actress)
• Stephen Baldwin (The Usual Suspects)
• Nadia Comaneci (Olympic gold-medal gymnast)
• Tiffany Fallon (2005 Playboy Playmate of the Year)
• Jennie Finch (Olympic gold-medal softball player)
• Nely Galan (producer, Telemundo)
• Marilu Henner (Taxi)
• Lennox Lewis (former heavyweight champion)
• Piers Morgan (America's Got Talent)
• Omarosa (Apprentice Season 1 contestant)
• Tito Ortiz (UFC champion)
• Vincent Pastore (The Sopranos)
• Gene Simmons (KISS frontman)

Here's the cast for Donald Trump's brilliant brain child: Celebrity Apprentice!

Omarosa Manigault-Stallworth:  Former season one contestant on The Apprentice. She made her name as a villain. She sucks. Big time.

Lennox Lewis: Former boxing champion. Tough dude with a British accent.

Gene Simmons: Kiss lead singer, married to Shannon Tweed, star of TV show Gene Simmons Family Jewels.

Tito Ortiz (pictured): Former UFC title holder. Dating Jenna Jameson.

Stephen Baldwin: A low-level Baldwin brother, veteran of reality TV.

Vincent Pastore: Played "Big Pussy" on The Sopranos.

Carol Alt: Legendary supermodel and occasional actress.  Alt is currently dating an NHL hockey player 13 years younger than her.

John Cena: WWE wrestler.  Will The Apprentice test for steroids?

Marilu Henner: Actress who appeared on old TV show, Taxi.

Check your publicist at the boardroom door â€" NBC is inviting celebrities to try to wow Donald Trump in the next version of The Apprentice.

And while it would make for a marquee matchup, don't expect Rosie O'Donnell to be among them.

"It will never happen in this lifetime or beyond," said Cindi Berger, O'Donnell's spokeswoman.

The network announced Monday that the reality show will be back in the middle of next season with the celebrity twist, the winner donating proceeds to charity instead of going to work for The Donald.

NBC had canceled The Apprentice due to low ratings when it announced its next season schedule in May. But the network hired Ben Silverman as its new entertainment chief shortly thereafter, and he called on Trump and executive producer Mark Burnett to revive the show.

No contestants were named in NBC's announcement. The network said it was looking for people with entreprenurial abilities in the areas of sports, entertainment and fashion.

Which, of course, raised the question of O'Donnell, Trump's nemesis, maybe getting involved.

"It would be great to have Rosie on The Apprentice," Silverman said at a morning Television Critics Association news conference. "Donald personally told me to extend an invitation to her."

Might Donald Trump have been fired from the network his reality show has called home for six seasons?

NBC's new schedule does not have a home for The Apprentice at the moment. But the show may still be renewed for a seventh season.

NBC's Kevin Reilly "expects to revisit Apprentice after upfront week to see if a spot can be cleared on the schedule," according to The Hollywood Reporter.

At the upfront presentations, he said, "We haven't made a decision. Donald (Trump) still wants to do it, Mark Burnett wants to do it."

Previously, Burnett had said he'd fine a new network for The Apprentice if NBC gave up on the show. We'll keep you posted about its future.

James Sun still isn't sure why he was fired by Donald Trump during the finale of NBC's The Apprentice: Los Angeles, but frankly, his subconscious was telling him he didn't want to work for Trump anyway.

Before Trump fired Sun and hired Stefani Schaffer at the conclusion of Sunday night's live The Apprentice sixth season finale, Trump told him: "I didn't like some of the dialogue... you know what I mean" - a cryptic comment that has confounded both viewers and Sun, the CEO of Zoodango.com, a networking website for business professionals.

"As of right now, I [still] don't know what the heck Donald Trump was referring to with this 'mysterious dialogue.' He looked at me and said, 'You know what I mean,' which confused me even more. I was completely dumbfounded," said Sun in blog entry he penned for Zoodango on Monday.

Sun says he kept a 150-page journal of "every single day" of the competition, and, after reviewing it, he counted "only two negative comments to me by Donald Trump," and both came following challenges and weren't particularly harsh.

"These were the only references to direct negative statements from Donald Trump to me during the entire season," wrote Sun. "On the other hand, I can give you at least 23 [journal] references when he gave me praise. Even when I took negative heat in the boardroom, Donald Trump stood up for me and did not fire me. So this throws out the theory that this mysterious dialogue occurred during the actual taping of the season."

Although he acknowledges saying some "negative things" about his competitors, such as Kristine Lefebvre, in his confessional interviews with The Apprentice's producers, Sun also doesn't believe Trump was referring to anything he said in those interviews.

"The reality is that everyone made these kinds of statements," wrote Sun. "The producers ask you all kinds of 'funny' questions that lead you into saying something comical or sarcastic about your competitors... the purpose of this is to make entertaining television. So this throws out the assumption that this mysterious dialogue happened during our personal interviews."

After ruling out the show's tasks, boardroom sessions and his confessional interviews, the 29-year-old Seattle resident thinks Trump might have taken issue with some of the comments he made during a pre-taped personal video the show aired before Trump made his final decision.

"[In the video, I mentioned how] I quit a six-figure job to start my own company and focused on my conviction of why I wanted to be my own boss. I also mentioned how much I enjoy my time with family. Next, I committed the big 'slap on the hand' by answering [a Donald Trump Jr.] question [by noting] that I am the current founder and CEO of Zoodango.com," wrote Sun.

"In the real world, this statement would be 100% okay. But on television -- especially on Donald Trump's show where companies pay millions of dollars for product endorsements -- any reference to a company is treated as an endorsement for promoting the company."

She may not be posing nude, like former fellow contestant Kristine Lefebvre, but Stefani Schaeffer is still making news these days. After all, she was just named the most recent winner of The Apprentice.

Here's an excerpt of her interview with TV Guide:

TVGuide.com: Congratulations! Were you nervous?
Stefani Schaeffer: No, actually, I wasn't. It didn't [occur to] me to be nervous. I'm fine with that kind of situation. Audiences don't really disturb me.

TVGuide.com: Did you ever imagine you'd be signing up for a season with so many changes?
Stefani: No, I had no idea that tents would be involved or that we'd be living outside. My idea of The Apprentice is living in this beautiful Trump penthouse suite at Trump Towers, doing some business tasks and going up against some vicious people for a while â€" that was my impression from the show.

TVGuide.com: I know a lot of fans were disappointed with the changes this season. Did you hear that at all from people?
Stefani: I did hear that from people. I got a mixed reaction. Some people liked the tents, because they just thought it was funny to watch people suffer, and some people just thought that it was demeaning and didn't belong in the show. So there was a mixed opinion, but with any show, I think you'll find that with any change anyone makes.

TVGuide.com: Were you disappointed, as viewers were, that the final task was… the final task?
Stefani: I wasn't disappointed in the Renuzit task, but in so far as it being the final task, I was disappointed that it wasn't at least a gigantic charity event or something for a good cause â€" I thought that that would be a good way to finish the show. If I could change anything, I would make that recommendation. It was a great task, it was. It was very challenging, it may not have seemed it in the final 60 seconds that you saw as an audience member, but it was a lot of work put into a very, very short amount of time, and it was a lot of moving parts.

TVGuide.com: What would you suggest to breathe some new life into the show?
Stefani: You know, I'm not sure. I think the show has a good format. I like the show as it is. I don't know that I would keep the tents….

TVGuide.com: Would you keep it in L.A.?
Stefani: L.A. was really interesting, and if the tasks are challenging enough, it really doesn't matter where the show is. The show being in New York added a heightened sense of, I don't know, anxiety, feeling like you're in a rush â€" I think that was conducive to it being an experience. But L.A. was good, too. We're so spread out in L.A., the stress is there, it's just different â€" it's with traffic, it's with limitations of when businesses are open and that kind of stuff, so I think both locations have their advantages.

TVGuide.com: Do you feel the show took advantage of the L.A. setting as much as you'd expected?
Stefani: I don't know. In retrospect, we did do two different types of commercials and we did do things, like the tour-bus task, that were Hollywood-esque, if you will. We probably could have done a little bit more.

TVGuide.com: Was staying under the radar a "genius strategy" you planned?
Stefani: My strategy was to stay out of the firing line, and that meant doing a good job and making sure I had the respect of my teammates, and it was effective. It made me end up in the finals and I did it without ever ending up in a boardroom. No project manager ever brought me before Mr. Trump to try to get me fired, no teammate ever said anything negative about me, so I think it was a great strategy and I don't think I was under the radar at all. The audience sees a very tiny portion of the footage, and I can tell you that I was as active throughout the beginning of the show as I was shown to be by the end of the show, so you can't actually fly under the radar in a situation like this.

With teammates who are all looking out to be No. 1 and be the winner, don't you think someone would say something to try to get you fired if you weren't pulling your weight plus more?

TVGuide.com: Definitely. And with your crew, you had very loud, boisterous people alongside you.
Stefani: We did. They were very loud. We had Chicago and New York adequately represented and quite a voice from Seattle as well.

Continue Reading...

Before The Apprentice can return next season - as creator Mark Burnett promises it will - the show had to name a winner for this year's edition in Los Angeles. On the season finale recap!

The show aired live from the Hollywood Bowl. And, of course, Donald Trump entered to fireworks, along with a cheering crowd. After a recap of the season to date, Trump called out the four remaining candidates: Frank, James, Nicole, and Stefani.

The commercials that the candidates created for Renuzit for the final task were shown once more. The Donald them asked some of the eliminated contestants who they would pick. Tim went with Nicole and pointed out that she stepped up to be project manager early in the process. Aaron endorsed James because of his technology background.

Trump revealed that the two job choices for the apprentice would be overseeing a luxury resort construction project in the Caribbean or overseeing the construction of Trump Towers Atlanta. When he asked each candidate which job they would select, Stefani chose the Caribbean, James chose Atlanta, Nicole chose the Caribbean and Frank chose Atlanta.

Ivanka Trump told Frank and Nicole that she wasn't impressed with their commercial. Don Trump, Jr. said he felt theye made a weak decision in who they picked to help them on the final task.

The Donald them stepped up and told Frank: "You hired Surya, who didn't like you. He wanted nothing to do with you. I disagreed with that choice very, very strongly. Not because of him, he's fine, but because you didn't get along. Your mini-movie wasn't good, you almost got fired in the first week, but I do love your drive. I love lots of things about you, but there are certain liabilities. Frank, you're fired."

From there, it was on to Nicole: "I'm a believer in romance, but I'm not a believer in inter-office romance. You love Tim, you like Tim, I think that's wonderful, but you know what, I want you to love me more, it's important because I've got to be the boss. I didn't like your mini-movie, it didn't have it. Nicole, you're fired."

During the last boardroom, Stefani insisted that she was the glue that held their team together, while James insisted he was a leader and Stefani was merely behind the scenes. Heidi and Kristine both endorsed Stefani. Frank complimented both James and Stefani and told Trump he was on his own.

Trump told Stefani that he was a little concerned about her going under the radar. However, he said to James: "James, you're terrific in every respect. You're totally creative, I love creative people, but there were certain things and certain dialogue that you gave during the course and you know what I'm talking about, that bothered me very much.

You're an outstanding guy. I really think you're going to be a big success, but for now, James, you're fired. Stefani, you're hired."

And that was that. Congrats to Stefani Schaeffer.