Roger Catlin | TV Eye

Piers Morgan Wins 'Celebrity Apprentice'

Nobody denied he was a jerk. But because Piers Morgan raised more money than everybody else on "Celebrity Apprentice" combined, he was named winner of the revived show that again lengthened its finale to two hours Thursday.

Morgan, whose very claim to being a celebrity is in question (he’s the former British tabloid editor turned mean judge on the same network's "America's Got Talent"), beat Trace Adkins, the country singer everybody seemed to like much better.

"Piers, you’re a vicious guy," overbearing show host Donald Trump began his last minute pronouncement, adding, "you're tough, you're smart, you’re probably brilliant, I’m not sure. You’re certainly not diplomatic. But you did an amazing job and you beat the hell out of everybody and you won by far more than anybody."

Unlike past winners, Morgan won’t go to work for Trump. Instead, he’ll get another $250,000 for his charity, for which he’s raised twice that through the season.

Trump couldn’t bring himself to say his signature "You’re fired" to Adkins. "You’re really a special guy. A special human being. A beautiful guy. I’ll always love you,  but for tonight," he said, slapping his hand on his desk and turning to Morgan, "Piers, you're the 'Celebrity Apprentice.' "

Daughter Ivanka Trump who has been one of her father’s helpers all year, told Morgan, "this would have been a very short boardroom had you have had a better beside manner."

"You don’t know about my bedside manner, Ivanka," he answered with a leer.

"That’s a great example of the tact your lack," she shot back.

For his part, Morgan had said of his competition just before that, "If this was a good guy competition to find America's the world’s most likable man, he would win immediately. But it is a business competition with a premium on raising money for charity."

As such, he went on, he boasted, "I won nine of the 11 challenges, more than everybody else; I rose $500,000, more than everybody else put together. I also brought in the biggest and the most celebrities."

"But you were not loved," Trump pointed out.

"Mr. Trump, you are not loved."

Be that as it may, the combed-over host bid farewell by saying, "It’s been a really great season. We’ll see you next year. We’re going to be around for a long time."

'Celebrity Apprentice' Final Two

Are you paying attention to this? I certainly have not been.

But making his mind up more on the TV drama aspects of it than who'd be a better apprentice (since the winner won't be hired anyway), Donald Trump Thursday picked Trace Atkins Adkins to go against Piers Morgan in the season finale of "Celebrity Apprentice" next week.

"It will be good vs. evil, the UK vs. the United States," said the real estate tycoon turned carnival barker. Trump could have also added: Drawling Southerner against unnecessarily mean second-rate British judge on second-rate reality show, "America's Got Talent," not surprisingly also on NBC.

But hey the road from the final four meant tough interviews with two other employees of the broadcast empire -- the barking Jim Cramer and Erin Burnett from CNBC, after which Carol Alt and Lennox Lewis were cut.

But they weren't gone long. Lewis was brought back with Marilu Henner and chosen to work with Adkins on the final task; Alt and Stephen Baldwin will be on Morgan's team.

The odd thing about the final challenge, is that both teams will be working on different aspects of the same event -- instead of having competing events. This is a charity auction and concert featuring the has-been Backstreet Boys (perfect for a has-been series of largely has-been "celebs"). So far it's fairly amusing as Adkins has to cater to the whims of his faded performing stars. The event and selection of a winner will play out over two hours in next week's finale.

And a second season of "Celebrity Apprentice" has been ordered for early next year.

Whoa Nelly

Nelly Galan, the least well known "celebrity" on "Celebrity Apprentice" got the boot Thursday, mostly because she should have been fired a couple of times previously. It was Omarosa who deserved to be fired, but Donald Trump loves annoying people such as himself, which is why the show has become the Omarosa vs. Piers Morgan show.

After a week in which Vinny Pastore first turned spy then rat then resigned, Stephen Baldwin was also about to quit (only to be talked into joining the women's team). Baldwin missed most of the new task because he had to go talk in a church (not because he had to play Barney Rubble again).

The task was to market a Vera Wang mattress in a window display. The women went for a wedding scene; the men, under Lennox Lewis, went for a Cleopatra theme. You never know how these things are going to go. The Cleopatra room looked like a mess. But it was the winner anyway and Trump got to browbeat the women one more time. I don't even know why I even watched this show or wrote this item. I guess I just wanted to use the headline.

More 'Celebrity Apprentice'

You'd think they had depleted the willing D-listers in the current "Celebrity Apprentice."

But the network announced plans for a second "Celebrity Apprentice" starting in January 2009 -- presumably with a different cast.

The current run has been doing well enough -- even without Gene Simmons in the mix -- to repeat the ploy, in which various "names" compete to raise money for charity (so far the difference has been in who can call the most rich friends for donations).

They've also upped the finale to two-hours on March 27.

With the writers strike still going on, what else do they have to fill the time?

Jennie Strikes Out

Jennie Finch was deemed too nice for the cutthroat world of business and let go by Donald Trump from "The Celebrity Apprentice" Thursday. Also, she wasn't much of a celebrity.

The Olympic Softball player hadn't done much to ruin her teams chances in a Broadway ticket selling competition against the men. But Trump didn't want to get in one of those fixes where he'd have to get rid of a name people actually recognized, as he did last week when Gene Simmons positioned himself to be fired.

Marilu Henner complained that the men's team had much more recognizable celebrities than the women's team had and that was why they were winning so consistently. On the other hand, they also had Piers Morgan dressed in a knight's costume. But he got Richard Branson, who once got into the Billionaire reality show host game against Trump, to give $10,000 so the men could continue to win.   

Gene Simmons KISS'd Off

Either he's a blind blowhard who can't see what he's doing for his ego, or Gene Simmons wanted to stop wasting his time playing on Donald Trump's "Celebrity Apprentice."

And either way, Trump had no choice but to "fire" the Kiss lead singer and send him on his way. Simmons had been asked specifically by Trump to cross to the women's team to try to get them their first victory. From the very start of the task though, he made his mind up on something different and couldn't be convinced otherwise.

So his former teammates on the men's team chalked up a third win as the women went down in flames. Simmons wouldn't accept defeat, and even insisted that he had won and that the executives who chose otherwise were wrong. It was a marketing task that dovetailed into ads for the same thing (just as guest judge Jim Cramer was hyped for his own CNBC TV show).

Simmons sealed his fate by choosing nonsensical team members to join him in the board room. Or maybe he just had another farewell tour to do.

Men Still Winning on 'Apprentice'

Men are still winning on "Celebrity Apprentice," led by Kiss member Gene Simmons, who seems to have found his niche as the kind of smarmy businessman who could really work at the arm of Donald Trump.

Except that competitors don't get jobs at the end of this season, they only get to donate prize money to their charity.

When you're this smarmy though, you also annoy the young women, which is what he did to Ivanka. He never really hit on her, as the commercials implied, but was just more rude -- he ignored her when she came to visit his team, then asked her whether she'd be sharing her information with her fellow women.

His team won the challenge -- making an ad for dog adoption, so wasn't chastised further. Winning means never having to say you're sorry.

The womens' ad was only a few degrees worse, but Trump made it sound like they had been soundly trounced. Project manager was Nely Galan, an unknown TV producer who conjures up an image of a brunette Charo. She survived getting fired as her team focused on the resident foreigner: Nadia Comanice, who had failed to distinguish herself in any role, but was hesitant to defend herself too much either.

'Celebrity' Apprentice Roster

Looks like the worst cast for "The Apprentice" ever.

If the reality show had any appeal at all, offsetting the discomfort of Donald Trump bellowing, it was the emerging personalities of eager young entrepreneurs and how they interacted with one another.

If we wanted a rerun of "The Surreal Life" we’d slog through the reruns on the TV Guide channel.

Yet here we have it, a cast for "Celebrity Apprentice" that is full of people we’ve tired from previous reality show exposure, from Gene Simmons (who may have a hairstyling segment with the host) to Stephen Baldwin (who keeps up his celebrity status through titles like this, "Celebrity Mole" and "Celebrity Bull-Riding Challenge") to Omarosa. Especially Omarosa, who wore out her welcome on the first "Apprentice" season.

Who could be more annoying than her? Well, Piers Morgan, the prickly judge from "America’s Got Talent," for one. He’s on board too (making you start to think the purpose of "Celebrity Apprentice" is to make Trump look good by comparison).

Vincent Pastore dropped out of "Dancing with the Stars" last season before it even started (a tie in to his "Sopranos" character name Big Pussy). But here he is on this roster, confident it won’t take as much exertion.

To be on "Celebrity Apprentice," like being on "Celebrity Fit Club" or "Surreal Life," is to admit mid-career floundering. So welcome aboard, Marilu Henner; step right in, Carol Alt; step up to the bar Nadia Comaneci (gee, you’re not a kid any more).

Trump boasts of course that all the top celebs were fighting to get on the show. But most of those who  got in aren't exactly household names -- most will need some explanation: former Playboy Playmate of the year Tiffany Fallon, softball gold medalist Jennie Finch, heavyweight boxer Lennox Lewis, Ultimate Fighting figure Tito Ortiz, country singer Trace Atkins –- all so low in their careers they’re willing to be judged by Donald Trump Jr. and Ivanka on national television (admittedly to depleted audiences since the “Apprentice” heyday). And who exactly is Nely Galan? She was producer of the worst network reality show, "The Swan."

They won’t be fighting to be at Trump’s right hand, as in past seasons; they’ll be competing to raise money for charity. The winner will get an extra $250,000 for his or her favorite charity. The season starts Jan. 3.

I’m beginning to see why NBC moved so quickly to drop out of the January press tour, rather than present this shaky cast for questioning.

The 'Idol' / 'Apprentice' Connection

In Sunday’s live finale of “The Apprentice,” it was fired candidate Surya Yalamanchili who suggested when asked that Donald Trump should pick as winner … Sanjaya Malakar!

The mogul/host seemed none too happy about the cross reference to the more popular reality show star, also ousted.

Surya, also an American of Asian origin, has another similarity with the “Idol” singer – his nickname on the website is “The Hair.”

But there was another cross connection between the shows Tuesday, when who should show up in the audience for this week’s "American Idol" performance show but corporate offspring and new show adviser Ivanka Trump.

Another New ‘Apprentice’

There was a time when “The Apprentice” finale was reason enough for stop-the-presses next day news and household name stardom for the winner. There’d be debates before the fact on who’d win.

By now the show has faded so much that Sunday’s finale of “The Apprentice” came and went with nary a cultural ripple.

Just 7.94 million viewers watched the event, a boost of 200,000 or so from the usual audience (good enough for No. 100). And Stephani Schaeffer was deemed winner in one of those awkward live finales, this one at the Hollywood Bowl.

The first finales for “The Apprentice” ran three hours, then two. Sunday’s was a merciful one hour. And still there was not much to do, except review the last task – two fairly terrible commercials for an air fresheners and banter with the candidates.

To look at her, you’d think Stephani was Trump’s next top model trophy wife and that she might have won for that reason. But alongside the other finalist James Sun, the seasoned defense attorney was a much stronger candidate in the boardroom. And though she was the first winner who had never been a project manager, she was also one who had never been brought into the boardroom.

The two finalists were better than the other two quickly eliminated in the finale – Frankie Lonbardi, the New Yorker who was a little too much like Trump and only narrowly escaped earlier elimination, and Nicole D’Ambrosio, who got involved with another candidate in a romance that took up so much of the season.

The first “Apprentice” to be held outside New York, in California (and the first to have an audition day in Hartford, from which nobody was picked) featured a  rich team/ poor team twist exactly like the failed one on producer Mark Burnett’s other show, “Survivor: Fiji.”