Yeah, I know, the our last recap said last week's The Celebrity Apprentice--the one where Melissa Rivers got fired, and Joan Rivers followed her in exasperation--is episode number nine.  Turns out, it's the tenth.  I hate double-episode numbers.  It makes me lose track.  Not to mention I almost didn't make it to the television screen in time, but I flicked the channel just to see Brande Roderick getting all serious to the camera about the Rivers flare-up.  "Game on," she says.  Then, the opening titles.  Money, money, moooney...


This week, we begin with Clint Black, who won last week, talks a bit about the charity he's supporting.  His niece fell prey to it, apparently.  He calls his brother, talks about the twenty grand he won, and boom!  Kevin, his brother, is apparently outside the KOTU room.  He's the father of Clint's dead niece.  He gives the money, they have some moments, and the country star hopes his brother doesn't have to go through that ordeal again.

Okay.  Breather's over.  Task time.  The remaining four contestants--Clint, Brande, Annie Duke and Jesse James--come in, and they're still wondering whether Joan'll be here or not.  Jesse thinks she won't be.  Man, he couldn't be any more wrong.  The elevator beeps, and--sinister music!--Joan suddenly pops up, shades and all.  "My taxi was late," she said.  "My team shouldn't suffer for something personal."  Yeah, well... okay.

Anyway, the teams are tasked to do two things for Chicken of the Sea.  First, they have to do a brand new jingle for the tuna line, integrating the lyrics of the original jingle.  Second, they have to do a 30-second radio commercial with that jingle on it.  Athena's stunned, perhaps panicking--KOTU's got Clint Black!  Grammy-winning Clint Black!  Brande tries to tell the camera what she feels, but kindof spells the expletive she wanted to spell badly.  Toink.  Annie's the project manager for Athena.  KOTU predictably goes for Clint.

Annie and Brande start everything quite certain that their fates are sealed.  Well, they don't know anything about making jingles, so to make themselves feel better, they decided to do some Google searches on the product.  Another advantage?  They're meeting the bosses of the company first.  "Natural, healthy, convenient," they say, is what sums up the product quite well.  Meeting's over, and the two start playing with soccer moms talking.  KOTU then meets with the bosses--and one of them apparently is a fan of Clint!  Talk about a disadvantage of sorts.  He's impressed at how Clint's working the entire thing.  Jesse knows they all have to work together.  Joan's worried the ad won't be as funny, since, well, it's Clint handling it.

Inside the limo, Athena starts brainstorming about a jingle.  Howling dogs, they say?  Perhaps.  Brande starts singing and it feels like I'm writing about American Idol rather than The Celebrity Apprentice.  "What's the best tunaaaaa?" she goes.  "Chicken of the Seaaaaaaa."  Sure, they're laughing, but Annie thinks Brande's got zero musicality.  Annie sings along, anyway, and it feels like you're watching a duet having stage fright and having no idea about what they're doing.  "This is so absurd, so we just try to have sun," Annie said.  Good point.

KOTU gets to the recording studio, and you feel that Clint's gone into a zone.  While Joan and Jesse start writing the radio ad, Clint keeps to himself in a room, strumming the guitar, writing down lyrics, feeling much at peace.  It feels like yoga on television.  One crossfade later, he's playing the first draft of the jingle to the others.  They do like it.

Annie's got some of their lyrics down pat, and sort of raps it--it's got no tune yet, after all.  Again, Brande tries to put a tune to it, and ends up reminding me of SpongeBob SquarePants.  They test their radio ad and try to whittle it down to the prescribed 30 seconds.  Brande sings again.  "Soooo close, yet sooooo far awaaaaaay..."

KOTU starts recording, with Clint on the mixing desk, and after a few passes, thinks the slower recording is best for the jingle.  He can, after all, reject and accept some ideas--that's what project managers do.  Jesse feeling that Joan's using him to get to the project manager.  The vibe's weird, actually.  Joan's all praises, while Jesse's sort of quiet.  Over at Athena, Annie's still worried that they'll lose this task since Clint's on the other side.  Still, she thinks their team will win it because they understand the brand very well.  Brande offers to wear a mermaid outfit to Don.  "The skimpier, the better," he quips.

Over at KOTU, Clint finished mixing the whole thing together, and Joan wants to throw in some comedy.  It's a flourishing, quite grandiose bit of instrumental, and just as it fades out, Joan throws in her idea.  "Cluck, cluck, cluck, cluck, splash," she goes.  Chicken of the Sea.  Hah.  Clint thinks they can't take a risk with the cartoony approach, and rejects it outright.  Joan clearly enjoyed that line, and as Clint listens to the recording one more time, she does the clucking bit again--this time, in a whisper.

Athena decides to quit worrying and record the radio spot first.  They have the script ready, anyway.  That one goes smoothly--Brande plays one of the moms, and Annie does the mixing, and after a few snags with the timing, they're done.  This makes me nostalgic.  I did these things in college!  Anyway, KOTU gets down with the script, and Jesse works out a "did you know?" game show-ish segment.  They had a couple of voice actors do the reading, but in the end, Jesse and Joan decide they'd do the segment.  She thinks they can record the entire thing in one take.  He drops a few "did you know?" lines during that chat.  He's gotten into it, it seems.  Or something.

Annie admits she's still overwhelmed with the jingle, now that the ad recording is done.  More so, she isn't having the everything-will-be-okay feeling she says she's always had in the past.  The team sits down with some guy in the guitar--I'm guessing a jingle composer--and plays with some of their lyrics.  "Moms, they want it fresh.  Kids, they want it fast."  KOTU starts recording their vocals, and Joan tries to get Clint to give them 15 minutes at the recording booth.  Clint's having too much fun, it seems, and since they can record the ad quicker, she thinks they should do it now.  Besides, she's "sleep-oriented", whatever that means.  Two takes, and they're done.

Athena's still worried--but the feeling has kicked in late.  Suddenly, they have a jingle!  Suddenly, they're recording!  Suddenly, they're finished!  Annie's extra proud of having done a jingle from scratch, especially considering that the folks at the recording studio were nodding all throughout.  "Clint can't do much better than this," she says.  "If we win, that will be the highest point of my life."

On their way to the presentation, Annie and Brande still can't get over what they just did.  Over at KOTU, Joan tries to throw in her cluck-cluck-splash idea at the beginning of the presentation.  Clint rejects it again, and proceeds to work the musical aspect of the ad, again.  "Another idea rejected," she quipped.  "Clint should not question the comedy."  Well, I'm not--after a few listens, I'm starting to laugh at the clucking.

Athena goes first, and Annie states that they got a female singer since 80% of Chicken of the Sea's buyers are female.  The jingle's being sung live, and Annie starts dancing along with it.  Brande's also happy, since their presentation's to the point.  Annie exits "to the tune of our own jingle," very confident that it's that catchy.  Well, it's an earworm, all right.  She also says--to the camera, of course--that she's okay with leaving the competition at this point.  At least she's done something she can be proud of.  KOTU's up next, and it's as straightforward as it can be--Joan didn't do her clucking.  Dang.  They're also confident, considering the star power of their products.  Clint Black singing a tuna jingle?  Exactly.  As they end, Joan's praising Clint.  A lot.  Pretty weird, I must say.

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