The Other Charlotte and I are both glued to the tube every week, but we disagree on what makes The Apprentice quite simply the best thing on TV right now. Why is the moment when Donald Trump votes somebody off the island with the spine-tingling words, “You’re fired,” the best moment in television every week?
First the areas of agreement: Trump cast as the tough but compassionate boss and New York cast as the glamorous but not so compassionate city are the stars. There is something romantic and endearingly old-fashioned about all this. New York-New York-it’s a-wonderful-town.
After conferring with two Trump executives, The Donald always does the firing. He always picks the right person, too. President Bush should forget federally-funded job programs and just require the nation to tune into The Apprentice. Trump has superb job hunting tips.
But it’s the–ahem–interpersonal dynamics that make the show so exciting. Every week the women bicker, call each other names, pout, and preen’and then they whip the guys. The guys team lacks sizzle, and they’ve made fatal errors the girls would never make. But I didn’t care for these women as much as The Other Charlotte. I often felt that I was at a really bad rush party.
One of Trump’s maxims is that you must always try to deal with the top people in any organization. When the task of designing an ad campaign was set last wee, the leader of the guy team ruled that they “didn’t have time” to go meet the clients. They got busy on their humdrum product right away. The women, of course, were oh-so-eager to meet the client. They designed a campaign based on sex appeal. Did I hear the word Phallic? I did.
The girls also used sex to best the guys selling lemonade. The Other Charlotte noted their bootie shaking last night to get a gold merchant to knock fire dollars off a bar of gold. What does it all mean for corporate America? I just don’t know. Yet.
Meanwhile, there was a hint last night that the women’s unbroken winning streak may be drawing to a close. Carolyn, the businesslike female executive who helps Trump with his decision, is heard in the preview saying, “You’d never get a job with us acting like that.”
I can’t wait to find out what was going on. I know one thing: That Carolyn looks like she’d be lots meaner than Donald if she had to–make that got a chance to–fire somebody.