TV-A Celeb Apprentice & Hell's Kitchen Rant; the New Reality Show That Will Make You Giggle

Celebrity Apprentice and Hell's Kitchen 2009 are over now. We've got some memories with pics and video from throughout the contest.

Along with my own fine rants about why the winner of each is not believable and how this will adversely affect future contests.

Plus a review of BravoTV's newest reality show that leaves me giggling through the night. Not at the basis of the contest but at the contenders!

Pic of the Day

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The Donald Pushes Our Suspension of Disbelief Too Far in Celebrity Apprentice 2009

The Celebrity Apprentice 2009 is a done deal as of this writing. Joan Rivers won but she certainly did not deserve it. And I know Donald Trump knows it because in the real world The Donald would never have chosen Joan over Annie Duke, I am sure of this.

First, some old pic montages and a video for nostalgia below.







Below a video of Joan doing her stuff.



If ever a show was staged it is Celebrity Apprentice but there’s nothing wrong with this. Donald Trump took his old reality show formula of having folks do business types of challenges and combined it with the Dancing With the Stars Concept by having celebrities do the challenges with monies won going to the celebs’ favorite charities.

Frankly I like the original The Apprentice series but that concept sputtered and turned belly up once Martha Stewart somehow got involved with it all.

So okay, it’s an idea that kind of works. Ordinary Americans tune in by the millions to witness “stars” looking for a career boost try to dance their way into America’s heart and on to better jobs in the public eye. Thus why couldn’t the concept be transferred to the old Celebrity concept, or so I ask?

Celebrity Apprentice has the same sort of “celebrities” on its show as on “Dancing With the Stars” ie, entertainers that have faded or haven’t had a gig in a while, sports stars looking for a way to make a living post playing field, oddball famous business types.

On the 2009 Celebrity Apprentice, Joan Rivers was about the most famous of the contenders.

A complete list of this year’s celebrities included:

-Jesse James-founder of West Coast Choppers
-Dennis Rodman-5 time NBA champion
-Andrew "Dice" Clay-once dirty mouthed comedian
-Joan Rivers-talk show host
-Herschel Walker-Retired NFL player
-Khloe Kardashian-the Kardashian without the nice ass
-Tionne "T-Box" Watkins-R&B singer
-Natalie Gulbis-Professional golfer
-Tom Green-Actor, comedian
-Claudia Jordan-Actress, model
-Clint black-country music star
-Brande Roderick-Actress and Playboy model
-Brian McKnight mutli platinum R&B singer
-Melissa Rivers-daughter of Joan Rivers
-Scott Hamilton-gold medal olympic figure skater
-Annie Duke-professional poker player, motivational speaker

We understand that reality shows need a conflict. We even understand that the conflict between Joan and Clint Black died quickly as Black was the most harmless guy on the planet and wore the winsome smile of Jesus himself. Thus the new conflict between Joan and Annie Duke was a little more believable than the Rivers/Black conflict but not much.

Annie Duke came off as a very nice lady. The scripted conflict between Rivers had Joan calling her Hitler and calling poker players the scum of the earth. To spice things up, we had Joan’s daughter Melissa as part of the conflict but it only made Melissa look like a bratty and totally unlikeable person.

Still we suffered the difficult to believe conflict but the real damage came when Joan Rivers won the entire thing.

First, Annie Duke raised almost half a million on the last task while Joan raised a little over a hundred grand.

But oh there were other factors involved besides amount of money raised, or so The Donald tells us with a straight face.

Go with me here, folks, in the real world, The Donald would have how much money earned as being the ONLY criteria that mattered as niceness and sincerity and glibness matter not when the bucks are rolling in.

Donald Trump WANTED to have Joan Rivers win this year’s contest is all and he didn’t fool me at all.

Annie Duke consistently presented herself well, she showed fine leadership, she was personable, she regularly won tasks, she was liked by her colleagues except Melissa and Joan and that was a manufactured hatred.

I say to Donald Trump, hey, it’s okay. We don’t believe that Joan Rivers won that thing but she’s waaaaay more famous than Annie Duke and everyone knows that celebrity is what it’s all about with The Donald.

The conundrum is, Trump better not pull the same stunt again. For as Martha Stewart just wasn’t believable in her version of The Apprentice, neither is awarded “championships” based on how famous the contender is.

Donald Trump needs to know that the American public can only suspend their disbelief so much.
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Danny Takes the Prize in Hell’s Kitchen 2009

Danny is 23 years old and his final challenger, Paula, is 28.

Right there would be reason enough for me to pick Paula over Danny.

So calm down. I know that age shouldn’t be the only factor in who’s the better cook between two people but I’d argue in the tender years of our maturing 20’s, a five year age difference is equivalent to a fifteen year maturity gap in terms of life’s experiences.






There’s also the little factoid that Paula could cook better than Danny. First, Danny’s quasi-restaurant on the final night had a seafood theme, complete with little resin fish festooned on the walls. Yet Danny’s most famous menu item was a great big old filet with a baked potato.

Now there’s nothing wrong with a big ole piece of meat but it was Paula who featured a halibut dish on her menu, this without the colorful fake fish on the wall.

Danny was also roundy criticized on an earlier challenge for his “signature” dish, this critique by food critics no less.

Finally, Danny did tend to display an arrogance often throughout the competition. While I’m all for plentiful self-confidence, Danny overdid it so far as I am concerned.

Paula was more a shade of grey compared to Danny’s bright red. Through every challenge Paula was steady, quiet, hard-working and rarely a victim of Gordon’s wrath.

But Gordon Ramsey chose Danny and now Danny will be the head Chef at Bogata restaurant in Atlantic City.

23 years old. I shake my head ruefully at the notion.
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Bravo TV’s “The Fashion Show”

Heh.

First things first. The link for this new Bravo entry is HERE.

Isaac Mizrahi is the host of this new reality show on BravoTV. Kelly Rowland is Isaac’s co-host. Kelly is a singer from Destiny Child as I understand it. I don’t get her connection to a fashion contest.

So I chanced upon this series one night and I do tend to like fashion and reality shows. A show featuring a contest for fashion designers? I figured …right up my alley.





First, this has got to be the oddest compilation of contenders for a reality show contest in the history of such things.

I understand, speaking softly here, that in such a contest, most, if not all, male contenders would likely be a homosexual brother.

Not that there’s anything wrong with this.

But we’ve got a fellow named Merlin who insists on wearing crazy head gear that makes me giggle. We’ve got another guy named Jonny who wears his hair on his head so that it looks like he’s wearing a huge Chinese dumpling on his scalp. The fellow sent home on the first night of the competition, a Jonny D…well here he is…below.



The premiere show had all of the contenders charged with designing a “must-have” clothing item. All of the contenders were divvied up into three teams. Each team member was then charged with taking the team’s “must-have” clothing object and incorporating it into a specific “look”. The look might include a “night out”, a day at the museum, a work outfit…like that.

Actually this part was quite interesting. Although the alleged “must-haves” the teams chose puzzled me all to hell. They included a pencil skirt, a bolero jacket and harem pants. My own wardrobe does not currently include any of these items, not that I wouldn’t look stupid in any one of them.

Every week an outfit as designed will be chosen and offered online at BravoTV’s web site for this series.

The bolero jacket was kind of cute and the looks designed for the item were mostly quite good. The harem pants, surprisingly, also worked well when included in some happening looks.

The pencil skirt, sheesh, that design team had to be nuts in the way they designed this clothing item. For a pencil skirt could be considered a “must-have” fashion item for a young, happening and hip career woman.

However the team designed that pencil skirt so that it was double-sided, a good idea, but it was also skin-tight, a really, really bad idea. The skinny model had to be cut out of it the thing was so tight.

I watched this show the second week and realized that the show was kind of patterned after BravoTV’s “Top Chef”.

The second week there was a mini-challenge for the would-be designers, along with the elimination challenge.

All I know is I find myself giggling while watching this show. At times I marvel at the clothes designed. There is a talent to designing clothes and if the designers themselves could stop being full of themselves, could keep THEMSELVES out of the arena, this could be an interesting contest to observe.
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The INDOOR plants are now in their glory in the gardens of Serendipity Shore.

The brown thrashers have another nest in the hedge roses. But what's with these "doors" the bird fellows keep creating in the shrubbery? And does the robin really know when the dog is leashed?

HERE
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It's down to two on American Idol 2009. One is the beloved of the teenyboppers and one has talent and more talent.

Can the force of the 12-14 year olds really create a talent injustice that will forever cast a pall upon the very soul of American Idol?

All with pics and video you'll find nowhere else on the Internet.

HERE
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There's little doubt who's going to win this year's Dancing With the Stars, 2009, competition.

For Gilles Marini is sexy, handsome and a damn good dancer.

So who will be second, Melissa or Shawn?

Some wry observations on this year's contest including a sarcastic little jibe at Melissa and her cute tiny lie.

All with pics and video you'll find nowhere else on the Internet.

HERE
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The sorry saga of Miss California should have taught us all about our future and those of us who dare to express our true hearts that would offend the very mean.

If only the Republicans would take the torture bull by the horns that entire joke would soon be past tense and the Dems would fall like dominos against the weight of a wrecking ball.

The Nice Guy of this Past Week, the Bad Guy of the Past Week in this week's Thoughts.

It all ends with a smile.

HERE
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