Before we talk about last night’s The Celebrity Apprentice finale, let’s just stop for a moment and think about how we got here. Over the past four weeks, or whatever, it feels like longer? Maybe four years. Let’s agree on four years. Over the past four years we’ve had the chance to meet and despise some of the least-known identities in the country and be exposed to possibly the most ungraceful product placement that reality TV has ever known, and that is a BIG DEAL. The Celebrity Apprentice has plumbed new depths of awful television, and as they say, if we don’t know how deep awful television goes, how are we ever gonna know how much cement to order to fill it in and build a basketball court on top. They say that!
This The Celebrity Apprentice season finale begins with a hefty recap of the last episode, in which the contestants had to shoot a TV commercial for Mark Bouris’ company, Yellow Brick Road; create printed advertising material; stage a launch event; and put up with Deni Hines being a literal crazy person. Very challenging!
Both teams – Unity, which is made up of finalists Jesinta Campbell and Shane Crawford with Deni Hines and Didier Cohen, and Ignite, which is Julia Morris and Jason Coleman with Max Markson and Polly Porter – eventually arrive at Taronga Zoo, the venue for the launch event. Of course Deni starts work harshing the vibe immediately! What did you think was going to happen? She doesn’t like the astroturf on the tables, but she’s overruled by Jesinta and does her horrible “zing” pose at the camera:
She says, “You say I’m not a team player? Watch this, biatch,” which is just a wonderful thing to say. What happened to the word “biatch”? I think I’d like to “catch it” on “the flipside”. Maybe call it my “homeslice”. Maybe take it out for a foccacia. A+. Thank you, Deni Hines. Meanwhile, Max Markson is fanging around inhaling helium & talking in a squeaky voice and Jason Coleman is giving a very serious interview to the camera about how he’s an “action guy”, and I guess you have to give credit to the producers of this show for capturing these perfect, crystalline moments in which the contestants’ personalities are summed up.
Team Unity are first up! Jesinta and Shane give speeches about why every Australian deserves good financial advice. Jesinta takes the aspirational angle (“If you’ve ever dreamed of owning a Porsche”), which Deni obviously has a problem with (“You need to shut up. You’re so sweet you’re giving me diabetes.”), while Shane talks about his mum who worked real hard but never got any help from banks. I mean, it’s a touching story, I guess?
Next they show the ad, which is not as terrible as you might have thought from the process they went through? It LOOKS like a TV ad for a bank, whatever THAT means. Great. Nailed it, guys. Unfortunately, Jesinta and Shane then choose to invite Didier and Deni up onto the stage, which is just in no way a good idea? “Let’s give Deni Hines another platform to be a nightmare.” No. Don’t do that! OF COURSE she snatches the mic out of Jesinta’s hand! OF COURSE she takes the opportunity to tell Mark Bouris that SHE wrote and sang the jingle at the end! OF COURSE she tells him that she usually gets $50,000 for her singing but she’d be happy to work for him in the future. Great job, Deni Hines. Ugh.
It’s Team Ignite’s turn next. Jason Coleman draws on his vast experience managing small children and shushes the crowd in a way that is very patronising and then explains to the camera that he has them “in the palm of his hand”? What? “We love being shushed because it makes us feel like respected adults.” – no crowd, ever. This fucking guy. He begins their pitch with a very sincere and VERY embarrassing monologue about when he visited the Yellow Brick Road branch. Here is exactly what he says:
“Three days ago I, for the very first time, walked into a Yellow Brick Road wealth management branch. And I can’t even begin to tell you how profound that experience actually was for me. I had no idea how engaged I would actually be with this product. At one point I actually lost focus, which is a thing I don’t generally do. I stopped listening and I stopped writing down. Why? Because I couldn’t wait to get to the end of it to ask them where do I sign up.”
Oh boy. Where do you even start? It is one thing to have to “sell” a financial management company on a reality TV show, but it is another thing to be a soulless, insincere shill about it, and it is yet ANOTHER thing to do it in a way that is completely unnatural and meaningless! He “engaged” with a “product”? Cool. That is exactly how a regular person talks. You need to stop being on TV, Jason Coleman.
Eventually – THANKFULLY – Julia Morris breaks in with a few bawdy gags about how Mark Bouris is a hottie (I feel so gross about being grateful for Julia Morris’ humour, but that is the situation we are in) and then they show the ad. It is definitely a better ad than the last one! It’s even kind of funny, in the way that you think “that’s funny” but don’t laugh. At the end, Jason Coleman once again points out that he’s staged 464 events in 2011 ALONE and he knows when he’s done a good job and he did a good job tonight. OK, Jason. That’ll do, pig.
Both teams head back to the boardroom, where Mr Bouris tells them they’ve collectively raised $540,000 for charity, which is great news! Once that nugget of positivity is out of the way the bloodshed begins. Mr Bouris asks Jesinta how she felt about her decision to pick Deni for her team. Jesinta says that Deni wasn’t a team player. Deni says she was. Jesinta says “it was very disappointing that a woman twice my age acted like a child,” which makes Deni do this face:
And Polly do this face:
Two great faces, no doubt about it. Mr Bouris asks Deni if it’s true she came back with the intention of “stirring the pot”, and she confirms that she did. Then she says she doesn’t like to “rock the boat” but she likes to make people “feel like they’re alive”, which, what? Very interesting metaphors over here. The interesting metaphors of a crazy person, I guess. Mr Bouris says he doesn’t know why someone would want to stir the pot and she explains that it was because it makes good TV, which is true, but whatever.
Next, Mr Bouris’ advisors critique the stuff the teams produced for the final challenge and, holy shit, they are pretty evenly matched, you guys! Ignite’s print material didn’t get the message across. Unity’s did, but there was no phone number. Ignite’s ad was better than Unity’s but they were disorganised. Both of them were OK at the launch event zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz. Excuse me! They were VERY CLOSE, that’s what I’m saying. Deni seems to realise that she’s come across as a scheming, mentally unstable idiot and tells Mr Bouris that Jesinta is just so smart and he should keep an eye on her etc!
The four returned contestants are sent to the winner’s room. Mr Bouris reiterates that there were pros and cons to both teams’ work, but Ignite communicated better, so Team Unity are fired! Boom! Goodbye, Shane Crawford AFL Champion! Goodbye, Jesinta Campbell Beauty Queen! You are both fired. No apprenticeship for you! Good luck finding a new job in THIS economy. (Good joke, Max. Thank you.) Jesinta walks into the winner’s room and Deni is all “No no no! Jess, no!” Ugh. Awful.
[At this point, let’s just briefly address the article in today’s Daily Telegraph in which Julia Morris claims that the Deni haters are racist bullies? She told the paper “Deni hasn’t just been bullied, there’s a lynch mob after her and I’m not altogether convinced that’s not something to do with the fact she doesn’t have white skin. The fact someone would chastise her about bullying by nearly bullying her into the grave just takes my breath away.” Firstly: there are many, many valid reasons to dislike Deni Hines and none of them have anything to do with race. Throughout this series she’s been aggressive, confrontational, pretentious and mean, and I doubt that selective editing is exclusively to blame for that. Secondly: it’s kind of a stretch to describe the backlash against Deni Hines as “bullying”? I’d hesitate to describe the way she acted on the show as bullying, because I don’t think every instance of someone being a jerk to another person falls under the category of bullying (JUST MY OPINION, WHATEVER), and I certainly don’t think that it counts if a person chooses accept a lot of money to appear on a reality show and then acts like a dick and people react negatively to that. Negative public opinion =/= bullying. An important point, I think!]
ANYWAY, all of this stuff means that it’s down to Jason and Julia! Mr Bouris tells them the winner has brought integrity, drive, focus and passion to the competition, and the loser has brought a silly little beard, a tendency to call him “Sir” too much and a passive aggressive demeanour, which means that the winner is Julia Morris!
Mr Bouris hands over a cheque for $100,000 for the Breast Cancer Foundation. Julia asks him to take the cheque back and give her and Jason $50,000 each, which is nice, I guess. Good one, Julia Morris. Jason says thanks for having us. He is a creep. That’s the end of The Celebrity Apprentice. Hope Julia Morris enjoys her Celebrity Apprenticeship!
Max Lavergne lives in Sydney. He tweets here and blogs at Really Really Really Trying and Rose Quartz.
