Made by Dave Medlo, sometime WWM writer and permanent head honcho over at the Medlo organisation.
Feel free to cut and paste the link…
http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=TXtvgceU08g
…then spam-spurt this motherlover all over the internet’s face.
Any ideas or suggestions for flogging this uncharacteristic slice of professionalism will be gratefully received in the comments section.
‘Bloodbath in the boardroom’ said the voiceover man before The Apprentice music piped up for the penultimate time this series.
As we already knew, this week would be the interview round. But this time five whole Apprentices would be grilled – I’m sure last year it was less. Add to this the fact that each candidate would be interviewed by four bastards each, the sheer amount of interview time meant this was a quickly-edited, non-stop whiplash of a show. Somehow though, the editors saw fit to fill half of it with shots of people walking from their interview to the comfy seats outside, which wasn’t very exciting.
The four interviewers comprised three regulars. The first was fat, beardy Paul – an unreconstructed sexist twat. Second was Gordon – whose name I couldn’t remember as I took notes, so I referred to him as ‘Stig’. Stig talks like John Major, looks like a well groomed ghost and works for Alan Sugar. He’s better suited to working in a morgue. Third of the old hands was Claude. A balding, boggly eyed managerial type who spoke softly before building on his reserves of anger until he’s actively reprimanding whoever’s put in front of him. All three of them, odious people – and Alan’s best mates. The company that man keeps, eh?
Added to the line-up was Karen Brady – that strangely attractive woman who was MD of Birmingham City. She might still be for all I know. She was a little wishy washy in her approach and visiting her probably came as a massive relief to each of the contestants – in that the most difficult question she asked them was what their name was.
Getting ready for the off, Claire was excited about the interview process as she styled her hair into a bizarre, Fonzy style quiff. Perhaps she already knew she’d be meeting Paul, who, in post-interview reverie, she described in glowing terms. ‘There’s something about ‘im – he’s hot!’ she squealed, whilst moistening her seat. ‘The fact he’s on 20 million a year?’ Lee asked, in an uncharacteristically astute observation. ‘I wanna suck his lips off’, replied Claire, making a nation’s genitals wilt.
In her interview with Paul she flirted outrageously, proud of her Club 18-30 past and boasting of her ‘eight million incremental profit margin’, whatever that means. Paul told her she was cheap – either as a reference to her comparatively low bonuses or her Repping past. It was hard to tell.
Claire sailed through, in truth – the only other notable incident being when Stig was physically unable to clamp her mouth shut as words flowed randomly and idiotically out of that gaping hole as she sat there like a big, fat babbling lemon.
Helene didn’t do too badly either. It seemed we saw very little of her. In an interview with fat Paul, she swore like a trooper whilst bigging herself up. Every swearword was greeted with a calm smile from Paul, like a proud father. He’s big on swearing it seems.
When Brady interviewed her, Helene seemed to sense that her audience wasn’t primed for that kind of language and so built a subtle rapport. The effect was ruined a bit when, at the end, she referred to her fellow contestants as ‘Fifteen gobshites’… but honesty is probably the best policy. Had to laugh at the ‘objective’ section of her CV though – apparently her objective is to ‘dive into the ocean of opportunity’. Made me picture Alan Sugar in a wet suit, using those big flapping hands as flippers. Helene as a mermaid. A lovely aquatic scene.
From the kick-off, Lee misjudged the atmosphere with fat Paul – and fell straight into what shall now and forever more be known as ‘the reverse pterodactyl trap’. When asked to show this move, Lee obliged whilst chuckling gamely – ‘oh mate! Unbelievable! – AWK AWK AWK!’.
The response wasn’t great. ‘This is a serious interview’, said Paul. ‘Why did you just do that?’ Lee’s pants filled with wee.
Later, when being interviewed by Claude he was asked if he was schooled in England. Yes – he was, he replied. The CV was filled with spelling mistakes – so not only is Lee a bit uneducated (no fault of his own), he also can’t use a spell-checker (fault of his own). Spelling ‘tomorrow’ as ‘tommorrow’ is pretty elementary stuff. Made me wonder if he ever commented on our 2 Pints of Lager post all those months ago.
Lee’s major foot-shooting was in lying on his CV. He said he’d completed a two year University course when in fact he’d completed four months then dropped out. This was the massive clanger of the episode. Sympathy for the dirty Spurs-supporting stormtrooper suddenly racked up as everyone in the country felt a bit guilty about having lied on their own CVS in the past (we’ve all done it). He wriggled out of it, both in interview and the boardroom, despite the fact he’d never get hired if sussed out in the same situation out there in the real world. As a recruitment consultant, you’d have thought he’d have known that. If you’re not hired Lee, don’t worry. There’s always tommorrow.
So we turn to Lucinda, who got the harshest grilling of the lot, and completely undeserved if you ask me. She’s a contracter, not an employee in real life. There’s not much more that’s entrepreneurial than that, surely? Pitching her business then getting deals with people? Somehow this was seen as a weakness. She’d never make a good team member, they said. She dresses like a dick, they said. She’s into Chinese medicine and feng shui, snorted Paul, the blinking fat cock. And so, just because she didn’t have the right ‘cultural fit’, the poor girl got booted. She was too good for it, is the stark truth.
For comic relief, let’s look at Alex. Long derided by the bulk of the viewing public, I think Alex has been great entertainment. A relentless and remorseless snake in the grass, this was the point when we saw that his enigma was built on vapour. There’s really not much to the poor boy. Despite looking like a Shakespearean actor, there’s nothing underneath but bluster. All he found himself doing in interview was screaming his age. I’M 24! I’M 24. YEEEEARS. OLD. An interesting, if slightly irritating tactic that didn’t really get him very far.
Alex is the most passive-aggressive, defensive individual you’ll ever see on your TV. One moment, he’s offering a faintly dismissive critique of a team member, the next he’s taking massive offence at being told he’s ‘a bit quiet today’ and being asked if he had ‘a heavy night’. Aside from reiterating his age until it was stamped onto the collective consciousness, he also let us know that he’s agile and dynamic. Which is useful down the gym, no doubt.
So Lucinda was handed her raspberry beret (the kind you find at a second hand store) and promptly shown the door. The big twist (ooooh!) was that all four will be in the final, two joint Project Managers leading past Apprentices. Lee’s got Claire to work alongside (poor bastard) while Helene’s got Alex (poor bastards).
And in other news, Nicholas De Lacy Brown has been crushed by a wall.
Ever been to a launderette?
I have. So I have a pretty clear idea of how much it costs to wash clothes.
None of the girls last night can ever have frequented a washroom or a dry cleaners, as when tasked with pitching business to a hotel chain they saw fit to charge £4.99 per item. So 1,000 items of bedding could be washed and ironed for the bargain-rate price of £5,000. This really was shake-head-in-disbelief stuff. How could that figure have been agreed? Was it that these girls have never had to wash their dirty linen in public? Or was it a case of one voice shouting louder than the others and the rest of the troupe following blindly and obediently?
The latter, you have to say, when you consider that the girl’s Project Manager for this totally shambolic episode was Jenny. Good God – what an abomination this redheaded, tube-faced monster is. We should have seen it coming when she squeaked ‘I just love sales!’ with a giggle of perversion (like she was sitting on a washing machine, aptly enough) in her week one vox pop. She’s this year’s Saira Khan but with none of the charm or bewildering attractive qualities. She’s this year’s Jo – (remember that insane Tigger contestant last year?) but with none of the slightly lunatic joie de vivre. In short – she’s terrifying.
The boys were ‘led’ by Raef. His leadership strategy involved splitting the chaps into the two camps he complained had developed last week and making the jocks do the hard work whilst the nerds strolled around town fixing their cufflinks and checking their reflections in shop windows. I’m no fan of Alex, Ian, Lee and Simon, but at least they get their hands dirty (for evidence, see Simon spiritedly battering that fishhead last week). They were destined to win – so Raef stays in for at least another week despite clearly being eventual Yer Fired-fodder.
Jennifer, oh Jenny. Where to begin? The girl’s made so many ludicrous errors last night that it’s tempting to think they were doing it for a laugh – or getting a fiver from the cameraman per mistake. So error number one was, as with last week, not considering that if you’re going to sell something, you have to work out the right mark-up. Blindly trying to sell something without considering its value is just beyond belief. After the £5,000 laundry shocker, they went to their next client and offered to wash, dry and iron his massive pile of shop-soiled smocks for a tenner. One twisted extreme to another.
As they wobbled along the valley of disasters, they left the actual nitty-gritty of actually doing the laundry to the very last minute. With huge piles of clothes sorted by Shazia, they set to work and realised they needed more irons and equipment, so went back to the house to pick up spares – only to find the boys had nicked everything they needed earlier in the day. From that point, they were doomed. The boys seemed to go from strength-to-strength while the girls added insult to their own festering injuries.
Trying to enforce tips? What the fuck? Beyond bolshy bellboys hanging around a bit too long, I’ve never heard of anything like it. Imagine a waitress talking in depth about the tip they expect to receive after serving you a mediocre salad. It’s not on, is it? Now imagine that salad’s got certain elements missing, like dressing, croutons and vegetables. For that is what happened – the girls lost clothes.
Jenny somehow pinned the blame on Shazia – saying she upped and left having only labelled some of the clothes. From where I was sitting (and admittedly I was pretty pissed up) I thought Jenny had ordered her to go with her. I could be wrong.
At one point in the catalogue of rubbishness, Jenny actually made Lucinda cry. Actual tears… I’ve had managers who’ve made me angry, managers who’ve made me punch inanimate objects out of sheer frustration and managers who’ve left me so washed out and overworked that I’ve stared into space for hours. But making your employees cry? That takes a special kind of graceless idiocy.
So how did Jenny survive the boardroom? Why did Shazia go? I was particularly pissed off about this as I picked Shazia in an office sweepstake. I was robbed!
The reason is, once again, ‘good telly’. Jenny will continue to writhe in her own two-dimensional villain status for the next couple of weeks and we’ll lap it up, criticising the silly cow to make ourselves feel a little bit better about our own offices, colleagues and careers. It becomes more apparent, show upon show, that this is only TV, pure entertainment and not the job interview it professes to be. But who cares?
I don’t.
Watch With Mothers 
