Archive for April, 2007
Saturday, April 28th, 2007
Roll up, roll up, it’s another week in the crazy world of marketing and sales executives! Or rather wannabe sales executives, desperate to work for Amstrad, leading retailer in um, the Amstrad Em@iler, and the no! Wait! Come back, it’ll be fun, honest! Seriously.
Well, we live in hope.
9.02: *Drums fingers*… Tum te tum…
This beginning section, the introduction and rehash that is the ‘previously on The Apprentice’ section, takes longer and longer every week. Logically, I suppose. One imagines that by the time we reach week ten (how many episodes are there, again?) there’ll be 45 minutes of ‘Previously On’ two minutes of footage in which someone says something mind-numbingly markettingy and someone else has a bit of a shout, then Surallun will point, say ‘Yeh Fiyud!’, there will be a five minute section on ‘Next week on the Apprentice’ and then we’ll all go home for tea. Ooh, it’s actually starting.
9.04: The phone rang, and the mysterious lady on the end of the line, claiming to be form the office of Surallun, ordered them all to go to St James’ first thing in the morning. They all seem terribly surprised and nervous by the order. Why not just ask the production crew for a schedule? I think that would help. I am going to write to them (”House of Idiots, Kensington”) and suggest this.
9.06 “They say the business of art is the art of business”, he says, clearly not understand what that means exactly. Which is fine, as the way he says it, it means exactly nothing. He keeps talking.
Increasingly, his voice sounds to me like a hairy boiled sweet stuck in a garbage disposal unit. I take none of it in, sadly. I think they might be selling art.
9.07: “Some of the art ” in Christies, declares Tre, made him sick. No half measures with you, are there, lad?
“There was a white plain canvas with a cello on one side and a lamp on the other side for 3 grand, when you could buy them all seperately for 60 quid.”
I don’t want to sound like a ponce, but where does he buy his cellos? Was it really a cello? Was it actually some jelly? You could buy some jelly and a lamp and a canvas for £60, I think. Although not from a *good* shop, obv. But that much jelly would make you sick, for sure.
Is this Tre’s Moment of the Week?
9.09: Christina leads Stealth. Natalie Eclipse. Christina looks smug, but not quite setlled. Natalie looks like she’s pooing ice marbles.
Again we have no idea how the team leaders were chosen. There’s no footage of them dicussing the matter, as there was in earlier episodes, so we have to assume the matter has been taken out of their hands and people have been alloted on the basis of - whether the tasks play to their skills or not - being good television.
Jolly, jolly good.
9.12: We’ve had a pop-artty fashion photographer first, with shots of lady-lips sucking on dice, and honey, and balls. Snooker, I think. Katie wanted to ‘enter her world’. Which is a bad sign, as perhaps it would be better to want to ’sell her photographs’.
Stealth are taken to a photographers studio, and shown portraits of his family dressing in animal masks lying on various roads. They are his Roadkill Family Album. Good pictures, striking, nice use of colour, and, um, composition, and all those things, basically very modern and a cross between Martin Parr, and Jeff Koons, and Sylvanian Families. Not everybody’s cup of tea, but you know…
Tre is quite literally sneering while looking at the photographer’s work. He looks like someone’s just held a plate of freshly boiled cat vomit under his not unremarkable nose. How very polite.
9.13: A horse photographer! Where’s Katie when you need her?! She’ll be lapping it up. If one does lap from a nosebag, I’m not sure. It’s not terribly royal, anyway. See, here I am, trying to decide if Katie is Princess Anne or her mount, and the programme is rolling on without us.
Christina loves Tim, and his horsies, and his client list of 100 people. She begs him to be theirs. He will not commit, but you can see he likes her. Surallun’s sidekick Nick is terribly impressed with the ‘bold move’.
09.15: Beautiful. Everyone else is worrying about the thing they’re going to sell, and Natalie appears to be spending hours on finger food. That’s right, Nat - the way to an art collectors wallet is straight through his fruit kebab. Especially if he’s looking at high definition road kill.
Simon seems to be being completely ignored: “But shouldn’t we choose the art? What about the art? The ar..”
“I’m thinking crisps rather than prezels? Whatchoothink?” Says Natalie.
Lovely editing going on here.
Sorry, that was a terribly Meeja thing to say, wasn’t it?
Well, when in Rome…
9.17: Katie is scooping all high-pretention awards, while seemingly having No Comprehension of Art WHATSOEVER.
“There work is story of the ocean and the life within” says the photographer, as we look at a photograph of a woman having her nips clamped by a lacivious lobster.
“Ooooh!!!” Says Katie, unconvincingly.
9.20: After visiting five photographers, each team has to choose the two that they want to work with. Both teams choose, what a big shock, the lippy lady and the horsie man. The horsey man chooses Eclipse, which is fair, as Stealth - led by Natalie - ran in, compared one of his powerful stallions to Nat’s highlights - and buggered off again.
Stealth net the lippy lady with the overpriced shiny soft porn.
And they each have someone else as well. Um…
Ah - Stealth have the fish/nipple artiste, and Eclipse have taken someone else who I’m not sure we’ve met yet.
9.22: Adam and Natalie clearly haven’t decided to put their differences aside after last week. They very obviously, overtly despise each other.
I admit, I’m not that keen on him myself. I’d quite like to find out where Adam works, selling cars, HARD. I’m not really in the market for a car right now, but if that man ever tried to sell me anything I’d stick whatever it was up his nose. And that would be dangerous for both of us.
Anyway. Luckily for Natalie, Katie seems to hate him as well. The quote:
“If Adam could just go back to the car sales lot and get run over, my day would be absolutely made”
Team, anyone? TEAM! Give me a T! Give me a… oh alright.
9.24: Interesting. The lippy lady, in a vote of no confidence whatsoever, has refused to give her client list to Natalie and Team Loser. In light of this, they have gone out into the streets of London with fliers, approaching wealthy businessmen and asking them if they’d like to see some art. That’s a silly idea.
Back at the gallery, Lohit and Natalie are putting up the prints while Adam phones around art socities in the yellow pages. Well, he mainly does that, inbetween getting bored, trying to help the others, and being put back in his box.
In a talking head, Natalie reveals that she doesn’t like him. Oh Really?
9.25: Tre, who, we have recently learnt, is not a fan of Darwinism, is stomping around in the basement of their gallery, shouting about ‘Nipples and Fish!’ This is interesting.
9.28: After yet another set-to with a team mate, Tre gives his considered analysis of the argument. “Limited intelligence has a habit of flapping its mouth, unfortunately” says the man who never stops yapping.
I’m conflicted over this. The man is clearly very upset and very uncomfortable dealing with the subject matter he’s been given, but instead of handling this in a mature, professional way, approaching a team leader and saying ‘Listen, I have objections to this type of material, I swap roles with someone else’, he’s huffing and puffing and screaming ‘Titties! Titties EVERYWHERE!’. Which comes across as merely petulant and lightly insane.
So while I can forgive him for having reasonable objections, I can’t forgive him for refusing to rationally raise them, and for frankly being an enormous pointy-headed-penis over it all.
9.29: Is This Lip-Photo lady a joke? She’s either been asked to behave like an appalling diva, or my god, she’s actually like that. Wah.
9.31: Tre’s making up his own interpretation of his given photographer’s work, having decided he doesn’t like the interpretation of the photographer who took them. Now, I’m not saying he’s not quite convincing - but I AM saying he’s talking whole bucketloads of fishgiblets.
9.33: An appearance by Fi Glover of Radio 4, and the comment box goes wild! As Wiid says, you have to wonder who on the production team was fluffing out the guest list.
Meanwhile, the hard selling candidates are selling with calculators, and still not knowing anything, Anything about what they’re doing.
9.37: They keep saying they’re in Hoxton. They’re not, are they? I thought it was officially renamed Trendy Hoxton about four years ago. By, like, the government. Or The Guide, or something.
9.38: Tre’s quote of the week: “It was a task that challenged me, but I found out that I’m good at just another thing, really. Another thing to add to the list of ‘things I do particularly well’.” Brilliant. I hate him very big much. But he Must Stay.
9.39: The selling is over, and loudly, from the sofa, a voice is complaining that we haven’t seen Jadine at all this week. Not a word. Not a peep. Or ‘That little scottish one’ (I think he means Ghazal). Which is a good point. Jadine, Jadine, the Branding Queen (see episodes 1&2) must have a doozy of an episode coming up next time…
9.43: After a very short all-group deconstruction, it is revealed that Stealth, having sold 14 pictures and made £4,597.00 have utterly trouned Eclipse, who sold three small prints and a bag of peanuts and made £2.46. Or something.
Go Katie, with your ’softly softly, talk about the art, connect with the feelings of the viewer, explain the concept’ approach. That’s not art dealing, that’s a hand-held gallery guide voiced by, oh I don’t know, Fi Glover or something.
9.48: Oooh, who’s going to go? Adam? He was very negative, and grumpy, and all of those things, but he did, at least sell something, and broadly do what he was told.
Surallun is very harsh about their choice of artist. Harsh but fair, I think he - and the Oxford Dictionary of Cliches - would say. The woman who had never sold a piece of art before, who wouldn’t give them her contact list, and who wanted to charge more for her pieces than anyone else. Idiots. I said they were idiots. I said.
9.50: NO! Natalie’s bringing Adam and Lohit into the boardroom. Adam, fine, everyone was expecting that, but Lohit? What’s he done? He’s been quietly supportive.
Is That A Crime?
9.52: Surallun asks Natalie why she brought Lohit. Yeah, lady? Why Lohit? Answer him! Apparently it was hard to bring fill that third seat, and Lohit was the weakest. No, Lohit wasn’t one of your best mates.
Then she and Adam have another argument.
Meh.
I want Natalie to go.
Don’t get me wrong, I’d still stick a car up his nose given the first opportunity, but in the Kingdom of the Annoying, the least annoying is, if not king, at least not as annoying as the other annoying people, who are more annoying.
Sorry, that metaphor was going to be a lot wittier when it started out. Bugger.
9.55: Adam, says Surallun, you seem to be in dispute the whole time. I think he means ‘in disputes’, but whatev.
“Adam, you seem to be in dispute all the time”
“No I’m not”
“Yes you are, you’re in dispute…”
“No I’m not!”
Well done, Adam. Cracking work, duck.
But who? Who?!
9.57: YES! It’s Natalie!
You know what, I don’t think I’ve been so worked up about this since it started.
But Katie should have been in there, and she overpowered Natalie, and Natalie didn’t take her in. And Natalie didn’t like Adam, and that turned from a professional anger to attitude, and bullying, and it was just silly.
And Yay. I was right. Hurrah.
10.00 And, over to BBC2 for the dull-as-dishwater ‘You’re Fired’
“And we’ll find out why the business of art broke Natalie’s heart”
Says Adrian Chiles.
Someone find his scriptwriters! Someone shoot those blighters!
10.10: A high-minded discussion on art is being held, which is fine as at least this week they have the panel for that. Basically not Vanessa Feltz.
Who is the panel?
It is outspoken art critic David Lee - and that’s not just my opinion, or in fact Adrian’s, I’ve just looked him up and it’s the first three words of his wikipedia entry: ‘Outspoken art critic David Lee’. And then Fi Glover, obviously, she was at the gallery and is a big favourite around here. And Alvin Hall, TV presenter and art collector. Apparently.
And they say no to the lips paintings. Well, that’s that then.
10.20: We get - as WilliamT points out in the comments - a full 30 seconds of unseen footage. Woo! Lucky us!
Seriously, in a half hour programme, and as much footage as they must have, that’s just silly. And it’s not to allow a whole lot more discussion, because there’s a hell of a lot of clips. They’re just old clips.
No, to be fair, the clip of Natalie’s mum and dad saying how much they love her we haven’t seen before, and that’s very nice, but not quite what I’m looking for.
Still, Nat likes it, and she’s having a little cry. She’s trying to look like she’s not, but she is.
Oh, it’s the Tre Hour. Hang on.
22.26: The producers of ‘You’re Fired’ love Tre, with a passion. An enormous passion. A warm fuzzy, shall we say (that’s what Paul would say) Minutes and minutes of a person who neither won, lost, nor came close to losing. You have to imagine how they’re going to engineer to keep him out of the boardroom for as long as possible.
Who do the panel pick for winner?
Well, Alvin though Simon was slow burner.
Fi has ‘warmed’ to Paul.
And Outspoken Art Critic David Lee wants Katie to win.
The audience hisses, but OACDL may have it on the nose. I’m still going for Lohit, myself.
10.30: And that’s it.
The audience, as if anyone cares, voted that Alan made the right decision to fire Natalie. Which, as always, makes no difference whatsoever.
The end credits is as always lightly stuffed with crosspromotion. Natalie will be on Breakfast on something something.
No mention of the Radio Five Live podcast, though? Maybe it’s going really badly. Sorry if that’s the case. If they’re ever stuck for avid-pro-Apprentice guests, you know where I am.
I’ve only called them all idiots… (hang on) …eleven times. That’s hardly ANYTHING, is it?
And it’s all over. For this week See you next week
Thank you, everyone, and goodnight.
_____________________________________________
[Full post and reader comments can be found here]
Television, Minute by minute reports, The Apprentice |
Wednesday, April 25th, 2007
Certainly, if Freddy was the undisputed King of Pointing To The Sky, Mika is a worthy contender for the crown, as he does point skyward very well. He is also very good at pointing at himself, which he does every time he says the word “me”.
I make a point of mentioning the word “me”, as I’m afraid once the singing bit starts, it’s pretty much the only word I can work out. Love me, love, love me, he keeps repeating, as repetitive patterns of lights flash behind him in carefully timed rhythm. Love Mika. Love love Mika. Must Love Mik…
Stone me! The clever swine has raided the prop cupboard of the National Association of Evil Geniuses and stolen all the visual aids from their How to Hyponotise The Populace Into Carrying Out Your Dastardly Plan seminar! As if to prove the point, Mika is suddenly joined by a small troop of bouncing victims. Or “dancers”, as I think they might be known. It starts with some vogue-ing silhouettes that promise a classy David Fincher/Madonna-style production, but 60 seconds in, that’s out the window and all Mika’s stage school friends in stripy neon Primark jumpers are skipping about in very happy fashion. Bounce bounce bounce.
[Find the full deconstruction, with pictures - the only way it makes sense, really - here]
Humour, Pickard of the pops |
Wednesday, April 18th, 2007
For no apparent reason, my thoughts have suddenly turned back to that double eviction a couple of weeks ago. Does that ground-breaking Apprentice moment actually mean that there’s going to be one show with No Eviction At All? Because that would be the world’s worst idea. Perhaps, instead, they will suddenly bring in a new candidate to shake things up. Maybe more than one. Maybe Jade Goody’s mother and/or boyfriend again. Maybe. Well, something to ponder, anyway.
9.02pm: Same old intro, same old schlock. ‘16 candidates have come To LONDON’, as if it were an achievment comparable to landing on the moon. There are lots of trains, I think. Aren’t there? I wish just one week they’d throw an extra shot into the opening segment. Just an unexplained shot of a raisin, or a fleeting glance of Surallun Sugar striding into the boardroom with no trousers on.
I’m now having mental image issues crossing Surallun with no trousers on with raisins. God. Someone poke my eyes out with a stick, will you?
9.05: The teams meet at Hamleys at 7.15am. “Surallun”, says the voiceover, “has a market in mind”. The mind quite literally boggles, trying to work out what this market could possibly be. Clowns? Retail assistants? Oh! Maybe it’s children!
Quote of the show so far: Tre - “At least we’re not all emotional like those bunch of women. Not that I’m a misgynist prick or anything.”
9.06pm: The teams are rejiggled, once more. Robbing us of a precious 5 minutes of idiots trying to elect a chief idiot, Surallun announces the team leaders will be the ‘previously quite negative’ Adam, and the ‘previously almost completely invisible’ Ghazal. Tre and Paul are moved to Stealth, Sophie and Natalie (Jesus, who was Natalie, again?) are moved to Eclipse.
The task for the week - to create, manufacture and sell sweets to children at London Zoo. Can they fuck this apparently simple task up? Well yes of course they can. That is why we are here.
9.07: At London Zoo, we are treated to shots of squirrel monkeys, penguins, and exotic pink flying things. Tre, Jadine and the evil Christina stop in front of a cow cage. “See that, that’s a cow. It’s a cow.” Says Christina.
Thanks.
9.09pm: Adam Hosker a confident car manager, says that he hopes to win hearts and minds during his time as leader. At the beginning of a brainstorming session on what should be the theme of the sweets in a zoo task, he suggests ‘Animals’. You can hear the sound the heads of the rest of the team hitting the table at once. Apparently this is too obvious.
I agree, but what else is anyone else going to suggest? Cars? Ooooh, what about eclipses! Eclipsees? Oh, where’s Jadine when you need her?
The other team also go with a theme of animals. There is more complex ‘branding’ within this, but it’s all just animals, basically. I’m hoping for some kind of ‘various types of droppings made of chocolate’ theme. Seriously. The kids’ll LOVE it.
9.10: During market research, every clip shown is of people saying that they would like healthy sweets, sugar-free things, oat-based things, all the fashionable things. Organic chocolate poo, then? Oh, all right, I give up. Oooh! Small trouserless Suralluns! With raisins! Oh! MY EYES!
9.12: What are the teams making? Hardcore sugar products. Because as everyone knows, when you’re wandering around a large place and then trying to get several children home in a confined space, what you really want is for them to be jacked up on as much sugar as possible. HELL yeah.
Oh god, Sophie, in between eating sweets, seems to be doing the shopping. Brilliant. 9,000,000 litres of chocolate please, wholesaler!
9.14: Without the handy guide of some people having penises and some people none, I am having trouble remembering who is in which team. Still, Ghazal’s team - Stealth - are making large chocolate lollies with monkey faces, which I’m betting will melt, and fudge, which no one will buy.
Adam’s team are making lollypops with natural flavourings - this seems a jolly good idea, and other chocolate lolly things. With, like, bear prints on, or something.
9.16: There is a ’stick’ issue. Paul, a man who not only sounds like he was born with a spoon in his mouth, but also sounds like it might still be there, phones Tre and the evil Christina in London to demand they find sticks. They find sticks, but too many sticks, and refuse to pay for them. They wander off to find other sticks, find no sticks, and end up buying ten times as many sticks as they need (though not before trying some dodgy buying practices on the way).
9.19: There is legislation that demands every single ingredient has to be listed on the label of any food product. And you’d think, with Natural Orange Lollies, that wouldn’t be a problem. Well, it wouldn’t, if they hadn’t decided to add hundred and thousands, jelly diamonds and other assorted tooth-killers for decoration.
Which means that every single ‘Natural Orange Lolly’ label has about 900 ingredients. Genius.
9.22pm Oooooh, bad idea. Ghazal, tired and stressed, is getting very grumpy indeed. And grumpy, at that, with Surallun’s aide, Margaret. It’s understandable, of course, they had a ’stick’ deficiency, and a chocolate-abandonment situation. Which meant they couldn’t start making lollies till later. When they do start, they make one at a time.
With monkeys on. Or, at least, monkeys in theory. In practice, more kind of angry aliens. Or diseased testicles. Oh hell, we’re back to trouserless Surallun again. Excuse me while I borrow one of those surplus sticks. Ah, that’s better.
9.25: Though Adam’s team have more than twice the amount of sweets of Eclipse, they seem to have decided to park their stall somewhere unproductive, in a corner, behind a building. It’s not quite as bad a position as parking their stall directly up an elephant’s arse, but at least that would have had novelty value.
9.32: There is a slight hiccup over labelling. Well, slight hiccup read cataclysmic fuckmoronity. Though the lollies were supposed to be called ‘Tiger Lollies’, they’ve been labelled ‘Natural Orange Lollies’ which they’re clearly not.
The lollipops are taken away by the stern Zoo Commercial Manager man. Brian. Don’t bother remembering that name, you’ll never need it again. Eventually, it’s announced that they can sell them, but they have to cross out the word ‘natural’ from every piece of labelling and signage, and have to explain to everyone they meet why they’ve been bad. Sorry, why they’re not natural. Same thing.
9.34: “Tre has a marketing strategy of targeting fat people” Says the evil Christina, in a disapproving tone, while selling to children by ducking down and putting it directly into their hands, bypassing their parents in any way, shape or form, or at least until she asks them for money. God help me, I don’t know who I dislike the more.
9.36: Conversation in the comment box, when I can get enough internet to read them (sorry!) seems to be considering the proper collective noun for wannabe apprentices. A melange of morons, perhaps. Or just a shower of c… oooh! There are things happening. Excuse me…
9.34: Adam decides to build up the sales on his team by putting on a lion suit, and wanders around trying to be jolly and encourage the children to buy sweets. Which seems to do nothing more than make children cry.
Then he goes and wanders around trying to encourage his own team to SELL sweets, which seems to do nothing much except make his team cry. Or rather bitch, and shout a lot. But it is the grown up version of shouting.
A lot of the emphasis of this episode seems to be on the relationship between Adam and his female team-members.
Hm. I wonder who will be in the boardroom.
9.37: Some time shortly after 4pm, Stealth run out of produce. They try and act all smug and excited about this, but there’s no excaping the fact that they’ve failed to make enough sweeties.
They wander about, looking sweetless, while Stealth sell their little brains out. At a loss, it seems, mainly, but still, at least they’re selling things, and that’s supposed to be the point.
9.39: And we’re into the boardroom. Well thank god, that zoo section seemed to last For EVER.
9.41: Ghazan admits they didn’t have enough product.
Everyone else admits that Ghazan was a rubbish team leader.
Adam admits that they messed up on the location problems. And the natural lollies. And a bunch of other stuff.
I don’t care about any of this. It pales in comparison to Surallun’s quote of the series so far:
“Natural Orange Lollies? It looks like a child’s vomit in Araldite.”
9.43: Ten pounds! Eclipse have lost by ten pounds. Though Stealth ran out of product hours and hours too early, Eclipse have still managed to lose. Adam looks like he’s going to cry.
9.45: While Eclipse go gloating, drinking and bowling (bowling?!) on the town, the losers have the traditional cup of Sad Tea at the caff. Adam says he’s not accustomed to losing. Well, everything changes, Adam, and you are a big loser. (Anna sings the Big Losey Loser song).
The Big Losing Losers go back into the boardroom. I’m having a problem here, in that I don’t know if there’s one of these people that I don’t find deeply unlikeable. The only person I wouldn’t mind winning is Dominatrix Katie, and she’s done herself down by showing her utter willingness to do everyone over, and quite literally ‘do’ Spoon Boy. sorry, Paul.
9.49: Surallun’s on fire! “Puke Pop!” “Sick on a Stick!” who Cares about the stupid Candidates, this guy’s comedy gold. Boy, someone’s been getting his oats, hasn’t he?
Adam clearly hates Natalie. And Sophie has just announced she has moral issues with the concept of ’sales’, which is slightly suicidal.
Whatever, not a single man is targetted during the full-team boardroom moment. It’s as if there are only three of them are in the room already. No surprises, then, when the final three are announced.
Welcome back Adam, Natalie, and Sophie, anti-capitalist hero to the masses.
9.57: Everyone gets shouted at, but it’s very clear that Surallun thinks that Sophie, who is fast developing a face that looks like a paper bag collapsing in on itself, was not cut out for a career in salesmanship, marketing, and you know, the whole thing.
Adam sits around, spouting But-The-Thing-ISes and casting acned and angry glances at Natalie. Natalie makes a high whistling noise that I can’t concentrate on at all.
Instead, I focus on Surallun, new successor to the empty shoes of Les Dawson (is he dead? Well, if he isn’t, just some of the shoes he’s not using), who is making a speech about engineers doing engineering, and lawyers doing lawying.
The chatter goes on, and after looking like he’s about to turn on Adam.
Sophie gets fired.
Bye bye, Sophie.
Now, over to BBC2 for the terrible and not improving ‘You’re Fired’ spin off
22.08:Panelists this evening - the something-something of Woolworths, Trevor Bish-Bash-Bosh, Vanessa Feltz, and oooh, it’s actually Surallun’s advisor Nick. Why don’t they have one of the advisors on every week.
One interesting moment: having spent ten minutes telling everyone she doesn’t believe in selling a product she doesn’t believe in, Sophie is sounding commendable and convincing. Then…
Mr Woolworths: I thought it was a good product.
Sophie: Yeah, thanks very much, thank you, I was in charge of creating it.
Well, then, you know, what happens to the whole ’something you don’t believe in’ thing?
22.16: Vanessa Feltz is to the world of business what a chocolate teapot is to teatime. Neither use, nor ornament, and flopping all over the place. She seems to identify herself with every single group mentioned. Salespeople. Businesspeople. Mothers. Children. Fat people. Women. Everything. This makes her, of course, absolutely pointless, as she quite literally has no point whatsoever.
22.21: Sophie gets to watch all the things that people have said about her. None of them seem to be a surprise, or upset her. Brilliant television. Thanks, BBC.
22.25: Montages of Surallun’s sidekick Margaret pulling her two faces, particularly at Tre trying to commit fraud over the issue of ’sticks’, and then of Surallun’s other sidekick, Nick, pulling his one emotive face 19 times.
The audience laugh and clap as if a monkey in dungarees is dancing to ukulele versions of Girls Aloud songs in front of them.
Where do they film this ‘You’re Fired’ show? Is it Greenland, or somewhere else equally desperate for live television filming experience?
22.29: A vote is taken amongst the audience to see whether they think Sophie should have been hired or fired. Obviously, this makes no difference, and since the audience only speak Greenlandish anyway, it’s more a vote for everyone’s favourite colour, I think.
And the ‘You’re Fired’ show is over. As one astute commenter (Northernstar? Nationwide?) said in a post earlier today, surely it would be more worthwhile showing a follow-up programme of unseen footage or something, ANYTHING more worthwhile than this.
Thank you to anyone leaving comments tonight - hello to anyone reading this as recap tomorrow, and goodnight to you all. Or to the former set, as obviously ‘good morning’ or good afternoon to the latter.
Oh I give up. Can I have a drink now?
[Full post and reader comments can be found here]
Television, Minute by minute reports, The Apprentice |
Wednesday, April 18th, 2007
Hello! I’m Natasha Bedingfield. You may remember me from such seminal clean-cut’n'catchy pop classics as These Words (I Love You), breakthrough US smash Unwritten, and… Um… Hello! I’m Natasha Bedingfield! I’ve got a brother!
Anyway. I’m here to explain to you the story behind my new chart-busting hit, I Want To Have Your Babies. I know you might have thought that with such a very obvious, cringeworthingly girly title, it might secretly be about world peace, or the emancipation of women, or the vital importance of reducing carbon emissions in the developing world, but it’s not! It’s REALLY about babies! Yeah!
Let’s get into this video, yeah? Well, thing is, I know that I’ve got quite the reputation for being this very clean-cut, straight-toothed, good Christian girl, and that’s great and things, but my manager felt that maybe we should be reaching into other markets, and, you know, “sexing it up a bit”.
So I thought “Yeah!”, yeah? And as the bible says, sex between two people within the bounds of marriage is a great thing, as long as it leads to procreation! Babies! And this gave me a great idea. So, anyway, I was in the gym, yeah? And I was having this great one-on-one session with my trainer Pablo, right? And he was touching me in ways that were really quite intimate, like on the knees and things? And we all know what boys and girls touching each other quite intimately can lead to, yeah? Yeah, holding hands. And that was it, he touched my hand, and the magic sparkle happened and I was pregnant!
[Find the full deconstruction, with pictures - the only way it makes sense, really - here]
Humour, Pickard of the pops |
Wednesday, April 18th, 2007
Anna Pickard wonders just who will be enjoying the delights of London’s new sex museum
Last night, I was fortunate enough to visit London’s newest genital-based tourist attraction. Amora is, it says, an Academy of Sex and Relationships: which in the flesh translates as a weird half-house of erotica and education.
Based ominously next to the Trocadero, the universal epicenter of tack, a descent into the Museum of Mating sees your senses assailed by the heady scent of essential oils, the powerfully suggestive hue of lush pink and red walls, and the frankly laugh-out-loud voice of a woman whispering ‘Lurve… Ssssex… Relationshipsss… Marriage…’ in a 47 decibel whisper. For a timid church-raised girl, this is not a little terrifying. And maybe that’s the point.
Split into seven interactive - if quite small - zones, Amora promises a hands-on guide to fulfilling your sexual and romantic potential. But it’s quite difficult to imagine who the perfect target audience might be.
First dates
After an awkward ice-breaking dinner at a safe West End restaurant, why not top off the evening with a tour of The Academy of Sex and Relationships? That way, you can learn where the G-spot is before it’s too late (there may be questions later), and discover in the Orgasmatunnel - sadly an impermanent feature, which may say something telling about the state of the British orgasm, I don’t know - how to tell a faker from a real orgasmer. Then, moving quickly through fetish (it is a first date after all) you can discover in the very last room (’Wellbeing’) all the nasty STIs you can get from unprotected sex, with pictures, before leaving the exhibits, entering the bar and boutique area, and getting on with the rest of your evening.
Birthday parties and/or hen nights
Large groups of giggling women may not be the target audience, but the large wall of hen night props in Amora’s shop seems to suggest that they are at least expected visitors.
The “intriguing and striking” wall of “Amora Spice”, a set of 84 male and female genital plastercasts in various poses (”various” in this case encompassing both “at ease” and “angry”, if you’ll excuse the terminology) might be intimidating for young couples, who will invariably measure themselves up against the exhibits; though hopefully only mentally.
However, it in is this room with it’s “Wall O’Bits” (as it is affectionately known) that a small group of women, be they on a simple girls’ night out or perhaps celebrating the impending nuptials of another, could really come into their own. In fact, I’d go so far as to conjecture that someone may some day have their eye out.
Overseas visitors to London
Amora seems very keen to differentiate itself from more prurient and obviously more-intent-on-titillating sex museums in other major cities. But the need to inform, provoke discussion and to educate seems to necessitate an awful lot of written material. Walls everywhere are covered in complex biological reasoning - all in English - and though the level of interactivity is good for a museum on such a topic, it’s difficult to work out how deeply you could penetrate the subjects at hand without a solid grasp of the written explanations.
And there is still fun to be had in a non-lingual sense, of course. The pleasure of slapping a mannequin with a paddle can be had by all (over 18 and willing to pay the £12/£15 entrance fee), because the question of whether you’re spanking too hard or too softly can be answered with a glance at the simple colour-coded guide.
And the “create your perfect partner” computer-generated model needs no explanation at all. Simple arrows either side of a body part lead to fantasy heaven - for anyone whose perfect partner is sized between about a Britsh size six and 10 (with ginormous bosoms), and has a weird computer-generated face.
Lonely old men
I assume keeping them out is the reasoning for the quite extortionate entrance fee: porn is still cheaper, and doesn’t show you pictures of penile sores, afterwards.
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It is laudable that people are trying to promote open discussion and a proper grown-up attitude to sex, especially in a country that has traditionally prided itself on a ‘behind closed doors” mentality - and I should know, I’ve been blushing from the moment I entered the premises until this very moment. But something just doesn’t feel right about this chic and dubiously-sensual hole in central London that treads a very wobbly line between titillation, information and exploration.
Their hearts are in the right place. I’m just not sure where all their hands are.
Travel & Food, Humour, Features |
Wednesday, April 11th, 2007
You know, after Rory providing such fabulous car-crash leadership last week, I’m almost a bit sad that he’s gone. But not sad enough not to carry on. After all, it is the way of the Apprentice. Each week you could swear you’ve seen the pinnacle of ineptitude, and then someone even more ineptitudinous comes along and makes the pinnacle pinnacler. Or something.
9.02: And here we go again. Same old introduction, and a round up of everything we’ve seen in the previous episodes. Which you can of course read in full on this site. Hurrah.
Hello, good evening. I’m in a flap because of stupid trains, and have a cold. But who cares about that - it’s these thrusting young executives WE want to see suffer. I mean strive for glory, sorry, not suffer. Well, AND suffer, let’s face it.
They started out 16, now there are 13. And you know the basic problem? I can barely remember any of their names. I blame the format. Each week, the focus of the entire programme is such that only people I can confidently name by the end are the people who then get fired, meaning that I’ve only got time to shout ‘BYE, insert-name-here!’ before watching the door hit them on the arse on the way out.
9.05: The candidates are enjoying a ‘rare evening off’, scarfing wine with full make up on while the camera crew happen to be hanging out filming in every room, when, as if by magic, Surallun knocks on their front door. As surprised as they act, this is no surprise at all. Even my coffee table saw that coming. But then, let’s face it, they did show it in last week’s ‘coming up on The Apprentice…’
9.07: Surallun rejigs the teams to compensate for the three boys that have been lost in the last two weeks. Weirdly, his compensatory rejigging takes the form of moving Jadine back to Stealth, with the other women, and Katie over to Eclipse to be with the boys. Um…
Surallun gives them £200, with which they are to go to Richmond and start up ‘any business they like’. In one day.
In the back of his car, Surallun reflects on the task at hand. Well, they’ve certainly got more in hand than when he started all 40 years ago (twice as much, and not allowing for inflation, neither, so less, really) and in his day, you did an honest day’s work for an honest day’s pay, and I remember when all this were fields etc. Etc etc.
9.10 Their ‘rare night off’ in tatters, the teams sit down for project planning meetings, first deciding who should be project leader.
In the Stealth meeting, they go round the table asking who wants to be leader. No one. No one at all.
In the Eclipse meeting, the thrusting young men all crave the leadership so hungrily that they eventually have to take a secret ballot to decide the leader. Tre is elected leader. Oh here we go.
He sounds reasonably balanced, for once. He will be a leader in a consultative way, and Katie will be a co-consultant. Just what the world needs. More consultants. Brilliant. He seems quietly confident, which is weird and disarming, like a lion humming the theme from On the Buses while conspicuously looking at something over there.
Katie meanwhile, has developed an interesting team strategy.
“Tre will be a great leader. And as follower, I plan to control him.”
Blimey. Get the crop out, Katie. I have the feeling he’s going to be a bad, bad boy.
9.11: The women decide to do face painting, approaching young children on the streets of Richmond, disfiguring them with stick-paint and then taking their money.
Naomi is the team leader. Interestingly, I hadn’t even noticed she existed before this point. Now I’m committing her face to memory.
If the men have decided to do anything, I have missed it, too busy worrying about the moral and legal implications of the Stealth plan.
9.13: Early morning, and the teams head to Richmond to set up their businesses. They have until 10pm, and can change business once during the course of the day.
It seems that the Eclipse are planning on offering gardening services. This is a stupid idea.
Meanwhile, I continue to worry about the girls. They have Jadine on their team now, and we all know what that means: Branding. The woman is crazy for the love of branding. All this makes me think is that the women’s team will be attempting to paint the faces of children By Stealth. Someone call the Richmond constabulary. Now.
9.15: We follow Tre and his little helper around some gardening shops. ‘Is this a good day for gardening?’ they ask. No, it’s going to rain. ‘Should we mow in this weather?’ they ask. No, it is a rubbish idea. ‘What about with an electric mower?’ comes the question. No, you will get electrocuted, says the gardening expert. They carry on regardless.
The sales team, meanwhile, are wandering the residential streets of Richmond, failing to get anyone interested in their guerrilla gardening scheme. Well of COURSE they’re having trouble, the people of Richmond have cheap Eastern European labour for that, don’t they? Because they all seem to have quite lovely gardens already…
9.16: The women appear to be doing brisk trade, and haven’t been arrested even once.
Jadine does do a Very good tiger, I must say. Well done, Jadine. Is it a stealth tiger?
9.18: Eclipse are discovering that gardening is quite hard and takes an awfully long time. A planned half hour job takes an hour, they battle with a large head, and only make about £25 for each hour’s work, which takes three or four of them to do.
All the while, I have to wonder exactly how much rental of all this equipment must have cost. Lawnmower, hedge cutter, strimmer, seriously - how much does that all cost? Hm.
9.22: After a busy morning refacing the privilaged mini-masses of Richmond, the women are discovering they have run out of children. Seemly without any direction at all, they run hither and thither, and find no children. Anywhere.
This makes everyone very tense, and finally an unseemly argument erupts on a street corner. Jadine shouts a lot, mainly repeating that she ‘does NOT talk a lot’ no, she ‘does not talk more than anyone’ she ‘doesn’t talk a lot at all’ and ‘everyone talks a lot and it’s not like she talks more than anyone else’. Sigh.
Naomi in a cutaway talking head notes that both Jadine and Christina are both strong personality types, but Christina is nice, she has worked with her before, and Jadine is bitchy and back-stabbing. I think there may be some team-favouritism at play here, but I wouldn’t want to call it.
9.23: Jadine is now shown explaining that Naomi is basically the puppet of Christina. And now I look at them, I think she may be right. After all, Naomi is like a little blonde version of big blonde Christina, doesn’t seem to do anything with out C’s say-so, and also Christina seems to have her hand up Naomi’s arse. Oh! No, sorry, sat on the remote and managed to find a repeat of Animal Hospital starring Trudi the vet and a Shi-tzu.
9.25: The women are still trying (and failing) to find children. Perhaps some kind of pipe? They could use some kind of pipe?
Nono, I mean a Pied Piper kind of Pipe. Not a crack pipe, this is Richmond.
They can afford better drugs there.
Note: Simon, among the things you don’t want to hear your gardener say… ‘Oh no, there’s a very thin line between weeds and wild flowers. That’s probably a wildflower, I think’. While your client’s shouting at you to stop winding that weed around her tree.
Hermionegold: Jadine has issews.
Ha ha ha ha ha. Well done. It is true. And also Katie is Princess Anne, Nationwide, you are absolutely right.
9.29: Eclipse have an idea for the evening, of selling a DJ - apparently Adam - to local wine bars. After visiting local wine bars, it is discovered that this is ALSO a terrible idea, as no local wine bars want them. And Adam seems to have lost all his superstar DJ sparkle, wandering around looking like a teenage CiF commenter instead. What’s goin on? I don’t WANNA, this place is STUPID, what’s the POINT it’s all so UNFAIR and I hate you all, etc etc.
Meanwhile the women have… EXCUSE ME?
The women seem to have decided to ’sell kisses’. Now, that’s a fundraising idea. What they were asked to do was come up with a ‘business’ idea. There is a subtle but important difference. Selling kisses to fundraise for charity is a one-off light-hearted-if-essentially-misogynistic cash-cow device. Surely if you were to sit down and expand the selling kisses business idea into a full scale business model it would be, well, prostitution. Wouldn’t it?
No?
9.30: Some of the women are not happy, and want to go with a door-to-door carwash instead. In bikinis, right?
There is talk of mutiny. Maybe Naomi shouldn’t be allowed to make decisions any more, they say. Don’t worry ladies, she’s not saying anything anyway, apparently, she is Christina cleverly throwing her voice, remember? BUT it’s Christina planning the mutiny! Oh GOD what a bunch of …[wanders off, despairing of her sex]
9.32: This week, Tre has an enormous argument with… Oh, everyone. This man can’t handle the pressure at all. Having already accused that little posh bloke with the lisp of being Katie’s lapdog, he now shouts and swears and shouts some more at Katie, LPBWTL and Adam, who are still failing to sell the DJ idea.
9.33: The women are split over the Kisses For Cash scandal. Naomi, eminent leader, thought it was a very bad and degrading idea until Christina said she liked it. Now she’s behind it all the way.
She asks for volunteers for the kissing. “Well, if we’ve got her, yah, and me, then that’s two pieces of equipment already…’
I CAN’T have heard that right. Surely.
9.35: Eclipse have suddenly settled on selling songs for cash. If this is going to be a rerun of the eye-watering Eclipse birthday song in episode one, I’m turning off now, and never turning back.
9.36: The women are selling their bodies for pounds.I am despairing.
9.37: In a nearby street, Eclipse are doing off-note karaoke versions of songs to punters in pubs that I think I’ve been in before but which, believe me, I will never go in again. Just in case.
9.38: The women tip out their pint jars and count the wages of sin. It’s powerful what an intelligent woman can do in today’s business world, isn’t it?
9.40:They’re in the boardroom. The women, when asked, all announce themselves to be reasonably happen with their team leader, apart from Jadine, who apparently didn’t get on with her. Who knew?
Did you like your leader? Yes, say the men. Yes, says Katie, red in face, through gritted teeth.
9.41: The money. Ooh, that’s a bit of a shock. The women have made £264 - but what were their outgoings? Some face paint? Some face paint brushes and, god, I don’t know, some coldsore ointment for after the lip-whoring?
The men made lots of money. Or almost doubled it, anyway. Well done. They get to go to some Cuban bar in Soho. Does Tre have anything he could improve on as a team leader? No, he says, he couldn’t do anything better, because he was perfect.
Eugh.
9.43: The women chew over their various failings in the café nearby wherever the fake boardroom scenes are filmed. Naomi and Christina back each other up, because they are best friends etc, and are starting to remind me of some girls from my PE class. No, not in a good way.
9.46: Where did they go wrong? The whole team names location as a main problem. Well, Brainiacs, somehow Gerri was put in charge of location. Have none of you WATCHED episode one?
A round-table blame-session is instigated. What was at fault? Leader. Location. Location. Location. Leader. And suddenly, in the middle of a conversation that could have been deflected onto location, leader, everything else, Jadine has started talking. And talking. And talking. (And this from a woman who doesn’t apparently talk that much!) Way to go attracting attention, Brand-Demon, I’m not sure you’re long for this world.
The decision must be taken. Naomi has to come back, who will she bring?
Jadine and Gerri.
…
Sorry, I fell off my chair in shock.
9.55: Back in the boardroom.
When asked, Naomi says she would fire Jadine. And backs it up with a lot of personal comments about why she would fire Jadine.
When asked, Jadine says she would fire Naomi. She gives lots of personal and other examples of why she would do that.
When asked, Gerri says MEEEHHHHHHHHH. And drones on in some indiscriminate ‘It’s not my fault I’m great me’ way that I blank out immediately.
Surallun rounds on Naomi. And then on Gerri. Then settles on Jadine. Blah blah blah, you’re a wild card, not sure I want someone so disrespectful working for Amstrad, not sure about you at all.
Then fires Gerri.
And now, over to BBC2 for ‘You’re fired’
Right, who’s the panel this week? It’s Jo, the terrifying crying lady from the last series, that Karen person who is a major business woman I’ve never heard of, and a man.
All your breaking media news, here on Organ Grinder. Seriously, I’ve no idea.
They’re all sitting there looking like they’re wondering how they’re going to fill the next half hour, stretching ahead of them, a terrifying a prospect as Stealth, standing in front of you, puckering up. And demanding a fiver for it.
Oooh, they’re moving on to the morality of selling kisses.
Clearly bored of Gerri then. Well, hands up who isn’t.
9.14: That wasn’t fair, sorry. She’s not dull. She’s just kind of THERE. And that was it.
Anyway. Selling kisses for money was a Bad Thing. Everyone agrees. Karen, Jo, That bloke, Mr Presenter, they all agree. So does Gerri. And the audience. Hurrah, everyone in the world was right.
So, um, how did they end up doing that, then?
AH! Breaking Mills’n'Boon news!
9.20: Oh. Not news so much. More conjecture, really, certainly on this end.
Judging by the comments about soppiness, glances, and mumbled comments, everyone seems to know that Paul (Paul? The small posh one with the lisp) and Katie are an item.
Oh really? Oh.
Well, that’s a disappointment, I thought they might just be friends. You know, a crazy boy/girl friendship. But no, according to this lot, they are busy playing ‘hide the small posh lisping sausage’.
He’d be a horrible boyfriend, let’s face it. He’s like a puppy. I had one like that once. Tried to dump him three times, and he kept crying. Eventually I moved 600 miles away because dumping him was just Too Much Hassle.
Still, bit of romance, eh? That should grease the wheels of future episodes - with Love-grease.
Oh god, that’s horrible. I’m sorry.
10.29: They discuss the other contestants. I become fixated by the panellist I cannot identify, who is wearing a tuxedo t-shirt. Idiot. Who IS that idiot? Freeview info thing isn’t any help. Boo.
Anyway, with nothing interesting to say about the other contestants (seriously, what’s the point of this programme?) they venture outside and get voxpops from the crowd, who hate Tre, love Tre, Hate Jadine and/or love her, love Tre again, and think that Simon is ‘alright’. Ah, the public. we love them so. The insight. The scope. (Not you lot, obv. You’re GREAT. I meant those other ones).
And that’s it. Another preview of next week (sweeties at London Zoo, another how-to in targeting small children, excellent), and over the credits a trail for the podcast - “every morning, listen to Richard Bacon and blah blah blah, with all the cock [pause] gossip from the world of The Apprentice”.
I misheard, right? RIGHT?
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[Full post and reader comments can be found here]
Television, Minute by minute reports, The Apprentice |
Wednesday, April 11th, 2007
It is a pleasant sunny afternoon. Just Jack is meandering through sunny East London, while sunny East London busies itself proving the rule that nowhere looks bad in the sunshine, even if it IS actually a scum-tub like the East End.The verse starts, and to celebrate, Just Jack changes his T-shirt. Several times.
(more…)
Humour, Pickard of the pops |
Wednesday, April 4th, 2007
After last week’s farcical inability to sell coffee to posh Londoners (how hard can it be? Surely only drugs to school children would be easier?) we’re back for another episode of the Apprentice. On the telly - obviously - and here, live. Hello.
According to the BBC’s Apprentice microsite, ‘in the second task, the team have to design an innovative product for dogs and pitch it to three retailers. Get ready for tears, tantrums and tension as the candidates’ creative skills are put to the test’. That’s what we have to look forward to.
Oy… An hour of marketing spods and, financial directors and wannabe-management gushing their creative juices all over Her Majesty’s BBC1. This has got to be good.
That’s ‘Got to’ in a ‘Please please please let it not be the dog-accessory-equivalent of Jadine improvising Happy Birthday over and over and over again. For an hour. Because I’ll cry‘ kind of way.
Oooh, I’m all tense just thinking about it. Nine O’Clock, then. Are we nearly there yet?
9pm: The usual spiel. Alan (sorry, Surallun) is being ruthless, candidates are being gormless, crying a bit, arguing a bit, being a bit power crazy, etc etc…
Round up of last week, which you can also find here, though I seem to have neglected to mention poor fired andy trying to cover the outline of his manboobs (or ‘moobs’, I believe they’re called) when the helicopter landed last week.
9.05: A 6am call summons the candidates to the London Eye to meet Surallun. One of the candidates - one of the ‘hunky’ ones, Adam? - is shown frying food and predicting this will be a ‘design task’. And if it is, he says, He wants to lead it. Oooh, that’s decisive.
At the London Eye, Surallun talks to them for a while about the London Eye, before announcing that he’s “not here to talk to them about the London Eye”. He’s a man of his word, Surallan. As long as that word is “Eh?!” Or “Amstrad Emailer”, obv.
No, he says. The task is about dogs. Their mission is to deisign an accessory for dogs. People will spend money on their pets, he argues, and the candidates have to create something that these “nutters” will buy. Surallun’s first rule of business: consider your potential market nutters. Brilliant. They will then pitch it to three ‘doggy retailers’ and the ones to make the most profit will… you know the rest.
9.07: The leaders for the week are chosen, very quickly. On camera, instantaneously, but don’t you believe it. They are Rory - it was Rory, the one before, not Adam, sorry - who is a ‘Bankrupt Entrepreneur’ (according to his BBC CV) and Katie Hopkins, who is a High-class Dominatrix (according to her hairdo).
9.09: The leaders have briefed their teams. Katie announces that she’s going to have a ‘firm hand’ over the team (I TOLD you!).
In turn, Rory goes “fucking crazy” for discipline, and will be sending people out of the room for “overtalking”. He would also like everyone to stop swearing. Apparently he doesn’t go “fucking crazy” for swearing. Nice edit.
Oooh, Jadine’s still in team Eclipse. I thought that was a one week swap.
Rory then makes everyone else take their jackets and, if possible, ties off, while keeping his on.
Mind games.
With your own team.
In the first five minutes of being in charge.
Eeeenteresting.
9.09: Research. The dog industry is worth £500m in the UK. They have to conceive and design something to retail at £30.
The first idea from the women? Dog nappies.
The second idea? A dog-powered fan.
The third idea? Dog nappies. The dog-nappy instigator pushes the nappy again. Katie asks her to ‘drop the nappy’. Hee hee hee.
The men feel like they’re under the thumb of a firm headmaster. I think Rory and Katie should get it on. It would be a happy, if hard-disciplined, match made in dirty heaven.
9.15: While the women are doing some actual research and deciding whether the shops they’re pitching to are going to accept the high-fashion accessories they’re thinking of pitching, strange things are afoot at Team Eclipse Base.
Rory’s split his team in two. Half have been sent out to talk to the “chavs and general working classes” about what kind of dogs they have (all his words, not mine, don’t shoot the blogger), while he goes through the designs his team have come up with back at base.
After staying out of the team design process all day, and dismissing all the ideas they present, he reveals his own design. And announces it’s the one they’re going to be going with. Um…
It’s a dog-walker’s utility strap. A strap for your biscuits, your ball, your bottle, your pooper scooper and, I think, your bullets.
9.17: At the petshop, on hearing Rory’s idea, Jadine goes crazy for the idea of ‘Eclipse’ and the prospect of the strap having lots of ‘Clips’. Now that woman is a branding DEMON.
Meanwhile, Simon talks to a dog owner who just wants a blanket. Just a blanket. You can see lightbulb go on above his head.
As BeefQueen says:
Are we sure that Brian Dowling isn’t using The Apprentice to resurrect his failing TV career, by pretending to be ‘bankrupt entrepeneur’ and this week’s team leader, Rory?
Bloody good point.
9.17 The women are talking ahout their ‘Doggy Bag’, a rucksack for dogs. What it will hold, and how it will fit. Sophie demonstrates how it will fit, by bending over and wrapping her arms around her tummy, over and over again. “Yes!” screams another Stealthette, “Like a coat! But not round the willy! NOT ROUND THE WILLY!”
Next time I go shopping with my boyfriend, I will remember to keep that in mind. “Yes you should get a coat. But not round the willy. Not The Willy.”
9.19: On the way to a focus group, half the group pitch the idea to Rory from the cab. Rory magnanimously allows them to present it to the focus group, thinking they’ll dismiss it out of hand, and not wanting to piss them off. Meanwhile, according to Tre, he seems to be pissing everyone else off more by the minute. Weird, that.
9.23: Half of Eclipse hang out at a doggy disco watching as Rory’s ‘Strap-on Dog Handy’ is dismissed out of hand, and the blanket is lapped up with open arms. Um, mouths. The other half of Eclipse is at the design company, looking like pricks. They have no idea, they have no product, they have no word from the focus group.
The focus group is in a car, talking about their beloved blanket… with CLIPS. Jadine, branding demon, is saying ‘clips’ over and over again. ‘It clips! It clips! Eclipse! Get it?’
We Get It.
Tre, the most annoying man on the planet Not Even Considering His Bumfluff, tires of talking and says ‘he’s going to shut the fuck up’. He doesn’t.
9.25: After another appalling example of non-communication, the focus-group half of Eclipse haven’t reported back on their dramatic findings with only a couple of hours to go. The Rory half of Eclispe have gone out and bought the equipment for the Stupid Strap-on Doggy Thing.
The focus groups reportings are reported. Rory puts the phone down on them.
Taking into account the relative time being spent on the teams, hands up who thinks Eclipse are going to lose?
9.28: There’s a night of arguments, Ifti announces that he
actually has a degree in Product Design but was ‘just feeling a bit lazy’. This doesn’t go down well. Tre and Rory have an enormous argument. I think this is going to be a running motif. ‘This week, Tre has an enormous argument with…’
Unless he’s fired, of course, which, let’s face it, is a possibility.
HFactor on Jadine, Brand Demon:
Perhaps she should develop some kind of branding tool that will burn the Eclipse logo into the back of a jack russell.
That’s the way, lass, Now you’re thinking like a Brand Demon.
9.30: Hang on, Stealth have made a cupboard?! Where did that come from? I missed that! Oooh, that was stealthy!
And in a shock departure from reality, Rory’s Strap-On Dog-Doodah doesn’t look quite as shit as it should.
Until he puts it on. The it looks like Rambo. If Rambo was doing an impression of a complete dickwad.
Throw the ball, and if you get bored - pull out the grenades! Wow. No one’s going to buy that. The mock-up designer man says it’s a nice product.
Boy. He wrong.
9.31: First pitch - Stealth bomb.
I mean they do badly. The team. Stealth. Do badly. Oh you know what I mean.
Eclipse do slightly less badly, although the buyer doesn’t seem enormously sure that people will want this. Anyone. At all, in fact.
9.33: Second pitch. “Why wouldn’t I just use a kitchen cupboard?”, say Harrods. First and last time I’ll say this - Harrods are presenting me with a value for money suggestion.
Eclipse are asked why you wouldn’t just put these things in, you know, a bag.
9.35: Last pitch. Eclipse are ecplipsed by a complete dry in the middle of the Ghazal’s Stealth pitch. Oooh, that’s going to hurt.
Has anyone shown any interest in these products? At all.
Hang on, aren’t two people going to be fired this week?
Or did I dream that? It was a happy dream.
9.37: Everyone s in the board room. Eclipse are asked what they thought of their, Rory’s, product. The strap-on. They thought it was rubbish. They’re asked what they thought of Rory as team leader. They thought he was rubbish. I’m getting a tingly ‘look how right I was!’ feeling’
9.39: Katie has her hair down. Unusually for the practice, this serves to make her look absolutely NO softer whatsoever. Ghazal’s questioned on her drying up in the pitch. Katie is praised as leader. How lovely. Aren’t women great?
9.41: How did they do?!
Oooh, this is very good tension building.
The boys - sorry, Eclipse, (Jadine is not a boy, she is a brand-demon) - got orders from two stores, and the girls only from one.
The boys got 100 orders overall, and a profit over all of about £500.
But the one store ordered 2000 of the Kitchen cabinetesque dog-cupboard (for when your dog is Really Bad) and made a profit of £5000.
Eclipse lost! What an enormous shock.
Surallun talks for a while. Apparently Harrods is one shop. Thanks, sugar.
9.43: The boys, in a caff (you know, for contrast) are displayed discussing things ernestly, then cutting away to talking heads of them planning to tear each other to shreds.
Rory says he’ll go into the boardroom and ‘kill off two others…’ So does that mean he knows two people are going to be fired? That can’t be so, can it?
Can it? You mean it’s Not Live?! I’ll SUE!
9.47: They’re in the boardroom. Everyone’s bigging up the blanket. Yes, it was a good idea. AND you could have printed an eclipse on it! And written Eclipse on it in big letters! With clips on! Ooh, I’m not watching, hang on.
Who’s going to go back into the boardroom. Hmmmmm. Has to be Rory, Tre and Ifti. Ifti been Baaaaaaaad.
‘Did you contribute, Ifti?’ Naah, not really. So here’s the man who last week told us that if he could break bricks with his hands, he can do anything. Apart from ‘be bothered’, apparently.
9.50: Ifti was missing his son, and found it crippling, and couldn’t concentrate. Though as a lady I am obviously melting at this, it apparently doesn’t make for good business.
HE FIRES HIM! Immediately! Blimey, we’ve only been in the boardroom a minute and a half!
I was right!
9.52: Ifti gives his good bye speech. Yes, his family is too important to him, he could have won but didn’t - But he swears to us, he’s still going to be a billionaire by fifty. Yeah, whatev, mate. You’re fired.
Back to the boardroom.
9.55 Rory gets to say his piece. He’s appalling. Asked what happened, he, instead of explaining his case, just described what’s happened so far in the episode. Who needs a round-up voiceover guy? We’ve got Rory!
Tre keeps interrupting. What a big shock. But talks and talks and talks and at the end of the day…
9.57: Bye bye Rory. You were a bit of hunk, but you were also an enormous public school (or public-school wannabe, which may be worse?) idiot.
Tre stays for another week. On his way out of the boardroom, he tips a wink to the camera. I want to grab him by the bumfluff, and kick him in the googlingtons.
10pm Right now over to BBC3 for Y’Fiyud
Updates move to ten-minutely, I think… I mean, it was rubbish last week…
Hang on, Maggie Philbin?! From Tomorrow’s World? And I’m medialy-ignorant so don’t know the oeuvre of the other two. What an illustrious panel.
Oh! It’s Toby Young! I read a book by him. It was rubbish.
10.10: Ifti justifies himself again. The hearts of broody women all over the world melt, again. The hearts of businesspeople nationwide harden. Nasty business people.
Joyfully, we get to see Ghazal’s drying moment. Again. And she’s not even here.
I loved the fact that she described the issue in the boardroom as ‘Yes, no, all that happened was that my pitch was slightly shorter than originally intended…’
How much shorter? Well as seen earlier, she managed to get as far as ‘Our product is blue sky thinking and your customers will really like it and…’
And then had to segue straight to ‘And I’m going to pass you over to Gerri’.
10.15: We’ve finished Ifti’s segment. His wife’s expecting another baby, ah, bless etc. Maggie Philbin thought Surallun was right to fire Ifti.
Phew. Surallun will sleep well tonight, then.
10.30: Adrian Chiles is being annoyingly lovely to everyone, again. Paxman, he ain’t. They should get Paxman to present this, that would be very hot. Not that I fancy Jeremy Paxman. Much. Oh, I’m all distracted and not watching again.
The failure of the Doggy-strap-on is laid, by the panel and Rory, at it being a fantastic idea, but not having enough time to realise it.
The failure of the pitches is laid very firmly (by Rory) at the feet of Rory not conducting the pitches. I’m thinking Rory would have been happiest in a big happy loving team-of-one.
Tre is given an awful lot of attention, fittingly, because he is awful. The man surely can’t work with anyone. If he stays another three weeks, I’ll eat my editor. And my desk. And my laptop. And chicken liver [shudders].
Rory, for the whole of his segment, displays his absolute Lack of Personality. Can personality disappear into such a vacuum between the end of an episode and the beginning of the clips show/deconstruction? Seriously, I want to take out whoever edited that episode of the apprentice - and managed to make him look like both a dick and a dynamo - and buy them many pints.
Does the panel think Surallun was right to fire Rory? Do the audience think Surallun was right to fire Rory? …
Well who gives a crap, he’s done it already.
Next week, on The Apprentice
Surallun turns up at the house, gives them some cash and tells them to make as much money as they can.
Hurrah! It’s bob-a-job week!
___________
[Full post and reader comments can be found here]
Television, Minute by minute reports, The Apprentice |
Wednesday, April 4th, 2007
In this video, we have two parallel stories being told at once. Thus, we shall tackle them separately, beginning with the love story, as we are in a tender mood.
It has been so since fairy tales began, and here it is: Girl meets boy. Severely anaemic/albino girl meets profoundly dumb coal-mining boy, to be precise. Twas ever thus.
“Eee, Graham,” she says. “You’re reet grubby from being down t’pit.”
He stares at her like an idiot. Or possibly like someone who is utterly freaked out by her nightmarish Manga eyes, and is trying to remember how drunk he was when they met and/or how dark the pub was.
Regardless, they fall in love. And have a picnic….
[Find the full deconstruction, with pictures - the only way it makes sense, really - here]
Humour, Pickard of the pops |