Melissa Rivers was finally eliminated in The Celebrity Apprentice 2 Episode 9, after which she promply stormed off the show like a two year old, except with a more foul mouth. Her mommy was not far behind her, saying she was quitting because her daughter was treated unfairly.
Brande Roderick would like to see Joan Rivers come back. She’d like to go against her and win, which she’s done so consistently throughout the season already, proving who’s the dumb blonde.
They walk in to get their task, and Joan is not there. Is she coming back, or are we down to the final four? She’s back, despite the fact that she’s got a(nother) personal vendetta, or perhaps because of it.
The task is to create a new jingle for Chicken of the Sea, while retaining the original lyrics, and also they will make a radio commercial. Annie Duke and Brande are afraid. Kotu for once has an advantage. They’ve got Grammy award winner Clint Black.
Annie will be the project manager for Athena since Brande was last time. At Joan’s suggestion, Clint will again be the project manager for Kotu, and Jesse has decided he doesn’t mind.
Annie’s pretty comfortable with the commercial, but the jingle scares her. She considers her musical ability to be slim, while Brande’s is none.
Joan is worried that the commercial will not be funny, which does not sit well with her because she doesn’t know how to do anything else.
Jesse and Joan will work on the commercial, while Clint works on the jingle.
Clint’s already got his jingle done. Joan and Jesse considered it brilliant until they actually start to record it. Joan makes Jesse tell Clint that she wants the jingle to be peppier. Clint agrees to record both but likes the slower one better. Joan even wants to add her own brand of humor to the end of the jingle, finishing it with cluck cluck cluck splash, which he quickly rejects. Ivanka cautions Clint that it sounds old fashioned.
Kotu has hired some professional actors, but Joan and Jesse have decided to just do it on their own because the guy sounds like a boring game show announcer.
Having finished with their radio spot, Annie’s still struggling with their jingle.
As for Kotu, it seemed like they already finished the jingle, but Clint’s a perfectionist and keeps plugging along, nitpicking at every little thing. Joan wants just 15 minutes so they can get the commercial done. He gives them two takes, and then it’s back to the jingle.
Annie has finished her jingle. It doesn’t suck.
Joan still wants to add comedy to Clint’s jingle. Can this one trick pony be fired already?
Annie gives the presentation for Athena, and she’s quite happy with what she’s come up with. Their commercial is two moms having a conversation about making food for their kids, which is perfectly in line with the targeted consumers.
Clint does the presentation and the singing for his team.
Joan thought Athena’s jingle was adorable, but she found their commercial boring because it didn’t have any humor in it. Clint found it to be very musical. Jesse thought it was not bad.
Annie thinks Kotu’s is really different, but since it’s from Clint Black, they have to give him credit for it sounding good.
The executives found Athena’s jingle catchy and liked how the commercial said it was fast, fresh, and convenient. The one negative is that they didn’t mention the tuna in pouches.
The execs liked Kotu’s jingle performance and the focus on naturalness and health. They liked the comedy in the commercial. The negatives were that they didn’t think everyone necessarily loved country music, and they wished there was more focus on the convenience of the product, which was ultimately what they were trying to highlight.
Athena has won because of their broader appeal. It’s an emotional win for Annie, who initially was in such despair that they didn’t have a chance, and she will be receiving an additional $20,000 for Refugees International.
Jesse blames the fact that it was Clint’s show again, and he didn’t really listen to their ideas.
Joan felt she was being restrained. She still wants cluck cluck cluck splash. Ivanka responds that not including that was correct.
Joan would fire the project manager. Trump agrees, and Clint Black has been fired. He is unsurprised that he’s been fired. As he’s walking out, he asks Joan to stop being mean to people. Good luck with that.
Clint joins Brande and Athena on the couch. Final four. Yay. Except Joan won’t even look at them, and then she walks out. Now the others can celebrate.
The night’s not over yet, though. They can all return to the boardroom.
Piers Morgan, the original The Celebrity Apprentice winner, will interview all of them, and then two more people will be fired.
Brande is up first. The first question is about the people who have suggested she’s not the sharpest tool in the shed. She knows that came from Joan, who initially said she was surprisingly smart but then changed her tune when she made it personal. She’d like to be the dumb blonde who ends up winning. Piers, however, doesn’t think she’s smart enough to move on to the final two.
Piers found Joan to be complicated. He asks her if she’s a quitter, since she previously admitted to him that she would quit. Her principles only apply to her daughter. Annie is a poker player, and she’s playing Joan. If it came down between her and Annie, Joan would kill to win. That’s something Trump would like to see.
Piers calls Annie the smartest contestant by quite a long way. Everybody wants to shoot the fastest gun. She thinks everybody else doesn’t understand the game, whereas she does.
He thinks Jesse, who hasn’t brought in any money despite being married to one of the richest movie stars in the world, must have a lot more than he’s showing us. Jesse says he’s there to prove a regular guy can do the same things as someone in a suit, and he says that he just leads a regular life.
If Annie makes it to the final two, she’d like to compete against Joan, the weakest player considering she should easily be able to raise money.
Brande thinks she’s the only one who could compete with Annie because neither of the other two have raised any money.
The Trumps respond that Brande’s been riding Annie’s coattails. Joan agrees.
Trump doesn’t think Brande has what it takes to be The Celebrity Apprentice, so she has been fired.
Trump asks Jesse whether he’s been holding back. He denies that he’s been holding back.
Joan says that she’s got the stamina to keep up.
When asked why he should stay around, Jesse responds that this competition is a little bit bigger than Joan.
Jesse hasn’t decided whether he’ll use his big knockout punch for the finale.
Due to his lack of fundraising, Jesse has been fired.
That brings us down to an Annie vs. Joan final two. Wow, big surprise. Annie’s the only one who belongs there, and I guess she’s got to compete against somebody. That somebody is Joan, who’s very unhappy who she will be competing against, like she’s unhappy about everything else.
Stay tuned to dingoRUE for another live recap of The Celebrity Apprentice 2 episode 11, where we will find out who The Celebrity Apprentice 2 winner is, which airs Sunday at 8/7c on NBC.