Two people went home in The Celebrity Apprentice 3 Episode 5. In typical double standard Trump fashion, Michael Johnson was told to get lost when he said he had to leave and was unsure whether he would be back (but should know when his plane lands), although Sharon Osbourne and Cyndi Lauper were given free passes for the week. Then, after the men won for a change against the dysfunctional women’s team, Selita Ebanks was fired because she did not have enough passion. Translation: her unwillingness to fight makes her a less interesting boardroom candidate.
Holly’s mad at Cyndi, as usual. This time, she doesn’t think she should have said anything in the boardroom because she wasn’t there for the task.
In addition to the $20k that Curtis won for winning the task, Clyde Drexler has brought a matching donation for Feeding America from Right Guard.
Trace Adkins will be one of the people following the contestants this week. They know this means music. The task is to makeover two young country artists for an interview and performance. They will be judged on the makeover, press kit, and whatever value they can add to the artist.
Cyndi steps forward for the women. Strangely enough, Goldberg is appointed by Bret for the men.
Holly wants Cyndi to be aware that she’s a singer, apparently, and not just someone from Hangin with Mr. Cooper. Maria, likewise, wants to be a singer as well. Neither of them are getting the sense that Cyndi wants their opinion.
Curtis was expecting two young kids, but in reality they get people have been doing this for a while now. The two choices are Luke Bryan and Emily West, both artists who have already released albums and have had some small amount of success.
Cyndi wants the female singer (the one who loves her) because she’s not sure how much she can do with the guy. The other girls don’t put up a fight.
Summer tells Cyndi they’re going to have to go into there negotiating like lawyers, which is something Cyndi is not comfortable with. One thing these women do have down is how to fight with each other.
Bret makes some phone calls to people in the business. Unlike Cyndi, he’d like to get some feedback from others with experience with these artists. Despite that, he has no preference nor opinion. Pick either one.
At the negotiation, nobody wants to talk first. When they realize their plan to get the guys to give everything away won’t work, Cyndi says she likes the girl. That said, Bret says go ahead and take her.
Once that’s behind them, the women get back to arguing.
Bret wants to bring out the rock star in Luke, hopefully minus the guyliner. Goldberg starts asking questions about his eye color and whether he’ll unbutton his shirt.
Cyndi really doesn’t want to leave, but since Maria’s been complaining about how her idol isn’t paying attention to her, she reluctantly agrees to leave to go shopping. Maria will handle the hair and makeup.
Bret prepares Luke for his interview with People, while the women leave it up to Maria, who says she’s got experience from her Playboy interviews about whether she’s shaved or not.
Bret’s struggle is that Luke knows exactly what he wants. They’re going to struggle to change him very much.
In the middle of the task, Sharon has returned. She wishes she’d been there the whole time because she could do this in her sleep.
When they return from their shopping trip, Cyndi says she’s horrified by the makeup, which doesn’t look anything like the picture. With Sharon back in the picture, Cyndi at least has one person she’s willing to listen to.
Trace senses that maybe not everybody from the women’s team is onboard. If it were him, he’d give her free reign and let her do whatever she wants her to.
In contrast, the men realize that this is all about Bret. Perhaps too much. When the rest of the team is stuck in traffic, Bret’s starting to panic. They’ll be left with maybe 20 minutes for the photo shoot.
During their photo shoot, Maria’s still steaming that her input is not wanted by Cyndi.
The interviewer thinks that Emily seems to have something she really wants to say, a little more focused than usual.
Goldberg would like it if Luke said “you know” 40 times less, while he seems to have forgotten the one thing Bret emphasized, saying he’s tired. From there, it’s time to select some pictures. The problem is that Luke really doesn’t want to be made over, and isn’t too happy about most of the pictures. Trace tells him that, if this is outside of his deal, he needs to broaden his deal.
The women are worried about some things they’ve left off their press kit, but it’s too late to do anything about that now.
Looking at the press kit, the judges are not sure they get fun from Emily, even if she did take beautiful (too formal) pictures. As for Luke, they wish they’d seen the smile on his face, like Goldberg kept telling him to do.
In the boardroom, Maria says that she thinks it would have been good for Cyndi to listen a little more. Cyndi’s response is that Maria sometimes stuck herself in where she didn’t belong. Her strongest player was everybody, except Maria.
Bret reveals that he didn’t get the answer he wanted to hear, but his daughter will be fine.
Goldberg delegated most of the task to Bret, who probably should have been appointed as the project manager to begin with, but the men stick by their decision to give each person/charity a fair shot.
Never afraid to speak her mind, Sharon thinks the guys did a much better job with their press kit. Trace thinks the one they did with Emily was a little more polished, although Trump criticizes the lack of airbrushing. As for Luke, Trace thought that they men were able to get him to do something, although he didn’t go very far. In order for him to become a star, Sharon says that he’d need to be willing to change.
The music industry insiders preferred the men’s press kit. The next point of judgment is the makeover. They thought Emily was more polished and shined in her interview. The women won that point. On the whole, who pushed their artist to make them break out? The judges unanimously selected the ladies to win.
As the winning project manager, Cyndi Lauper gets $20,000 for her charity, the Stonewall Community Foundation for the True Colors Fund. Additionally, Emily and Luke will donate all iTunes proceeds for their new singles for the next month.
While the men may be the more cohesive team, one of their members will now be fired, while the women survive to bicker another week.
Bret accepts the responsibility for the loss if somebody has to be fired. Curtis would fire Bret. Between himself and Bret, Goldberg doesn’t have an answer who should go.
Because he stepped up as project manager for a task for which he shouldn’t have, Goldberg has been fired. Unlike the typical yes men by Trump’s side (usually his children), Trace disagrees with the decision.
Stay tuned to dingoRUE for another live recap of Celebrity Apprentice 3 Episode 7, which airs Sunday at 9/8c on NBC.