The Celebrity Apprentice

NBC Reality
The Apprentice Insider: An Ex-Apprentice's Love/Hate Affair with The Celebrity Apprentice
John Kubicek
John Kubicek
Senior Writer, BuddyTV
Every week on BuddyTV, former Apprentice contestant Jenn Hoffman will share her unique insights on the current season.  Find out what happened in last night's boardroom from someone who has actually been there.

I can barely bring myself to write anything about the latest episode. What would be the point? Here are some things we know about The Celebrity Apprentice, thus far.

The Celebrity Apprentice has been a surprisingly good show so far, but it peaked in week five with the Sopranos-style episode.

• Unfortunately The Celebrity Apprentice has become nothing more than a name-dropping pissing and oinking contest. The best episodes are the ones in which we see these “celebrities” roll up their sleeves and be creative – like the Crocs episode. I don’t care who knows more “famous” people who can write a check for 5K. I want to see these celebrities WORK.

• Then again, apparently it doesn’t matter who knows the “famous-est” people or who raises the most money, because Trump will fire (or not fire) at random anyway.

• Ivanka Trump is hot. That’s right bitches, hot.

• Donald Trump is a hypocrite: In weeks one, two and four he fired candidates simply for not fighting hard enough. He essentially said Tiffany, Nadia and Jennie were too nice to win. Now in week seven he turns around and let’s an entire team off the hook because they are too nice to fight. Suddenly nice is good. Make up your mind, Trump.

• Enough with the Omarosa vs. Piers crap. Omarosa is becoming a one-dimensional character who is only there to annoy. I don’t know if she is really like this or if the producers are presenting her as incapable of doing anything other than be a total bitch, but either way it’s getting tired. We don’t love to hate her anymore; we just kind of hate her.

• The audience might like to actually see the celebrities behave like professional business men and women. No hissy fits, no team changing, no personal attacks, no favors from celebrity friends, no careering, no hair and make -up team, no excuses. Just a calculated and intelligent battle to win The Apprentice.

• The audience expects to see someone fired each week. I don’t know about other seasons of The Apprentice, but during my year (Season 6), there were plenty of times when no particular person was at fault for the loss. The team was happy, everyone worked well together and there wasn’t really a clear person to send packing. Instead of letting us off the hook – they pretty much MADE us fight. Trump forced us to single out a “bad team member” and name a firee in the boardroom or be penalized as someone too weak to criticize your teammates. Sometimes one team lost by less than $100. Last night a team lost by more than $5,000. Clearly someone was at fault, but Trump was too “charitable” to expose this person. That is what made this episode so unpalatable. That and pretty much everything that came out of Omorosa’s mouth made the audience squirm.

Lipstick Jungle is the worst show on television. Actually it was the second worst show last week, after The Celebrity Apprentice.

• Do better next time, Celebrity Apprentice.

-Jenn Hoffman, The Apprentice LA contestant
(Image courtesy of NBC)

Jenn Hoffman was the eighth contestant fired from The Apprentice Los Angeles. With an MBA in marketing and background in brand management, business to business sales and public relations, she used her business savvy to secure her spot on the sixth season of show. Jenn is now a television host, business reporter and CEO of The J Brand Group. Her website is www.jennhoffman.com.