Comic Relief Does The Apprentice

Comic Relief Does The Apprentice
Genre Reality
Created by Mark Burnett
Starring Alan Sugar
Country of origin United Kingdom
No. of series 2
No. of episodes 4 (as of 13 March 2009)
Production company(s) talkbackTHAMES
Mark Burnett Productions
Release
Original network BBC One
Original release 15 March 2007 – 13 March 2009
Chronology
Related shows The Apprentice
Comic Relief
External links
Website

Comic Relief Does The Apprentice is a special celebrity version of British reality television series The Apprentice, produced to raise money for Comic Relief.[1] The first edition aired in March 2007, and the second in March 2009. Five male celebrities and five female celebrities took part in the show to complete a designated task. The task in the 2007 edition was to run a funfair.[2] The show first aired on BBC One at 2100 GMT on 15 March 2007[3] and concluded on 16 March 2007 during the main Comic Relief programme.[4] The first episode of the show received strong viewing figures of 6.72 million. It became the fifth most watched programme on BBC One that week.[5] The show returned on 12 March 2009 for the Comic Relief 2009 event, where the woman's team triumphed. This would prove to be the final charity Apprentice series, in part because of the time needed each year to film the newly commissioned Junior Apprentice series.

Just weeks before the show aired in early 2007, it was spoofed in the television programme Kombat Opera Presents The Applicants.[6]

2007

The celebrities who were contestants on the programme are listed below.[7][8]

The Apprentice UK

Comic Relief Does The Apprentice

Men's Team

Candidate Claim to fame
Danny Baker Broadcaster
Alastair Campbell - Project Manager Journalist, former government press officer
Rupert Everett

(Resigned after one day - replaced by first Apprentice winner Tim Campbell)

 Actor
Ross Kemp Actor
Piers Morgan - Fired Former newspaper editor turned broadcaster, journalist

Women's Team - Winners

Candidate Claim to fame
Karren Brady - Project Manager Businesswoman
Jo Brand Comedian
Cheryl Cole Singer
Maureen Lipman Actress, comedian and columnist
Trinny Woodall Fashion guru and television presenter

Results

The women won in the categories "ticket sales" and "food and drinks", as well as claiming the overall win in terms of total money raised, while the men managed to pull off a victory in the "rides" category. Together, the teams raised over a million pounds for charity.

Men's Team Women's Team Both teams
Ticket sales £180,830 £662,325 £843,155
Rides £96,876 £71,347 £168,223
Food and drinks £8,550 £41,327.50 £49,788.50
Total £286,256 £774,998.50 £1,061,254.50

Everett walked off the show during filming on the first day, as he was uncomfortable with the Big Brother style experience.[9] He was replaced by the first UK Apprentice Tim Campbell. Radio host Chris Moyles was asked to appear as a contestant, but declined the offer.[10]

Overview

The task allocated during the show was to run a funfair. The team which produced the most money for Comic Relief via ticket, food, and ride sales would win. The teams were then gathered at Alan Sugar's office and briefed on the task ahead. The girls chose Karren Brady as their team leader, and the boys chose Alastair Campbell.

The celebrities were then given a list of all rides and attractions that would be offered at the funfair, leaving the teams to bargain over who would get which rides. The teams then called and visited celebrities to sell tickets and gain donations. The largest donation for a ticket was £150,000 from a friend of Trinny Woodall.[11] During filming, Woodall was involved in a brawl with fellow contestant Piers Morgan. The scuffle occurred when Morgan led a chef, that Woodall had arranged, to believe that he had been arranged to cook for the boy's team at the funfair. On trying to retrieve her chef, Woodall was shoved by Morgan and Alastair Campbell, which reduced her to tears.[12]

Celebrities who attended the funfair and donated money included Simon Cowell, McFly, Ashley Cole, Anne Robinson, Tracey Emin, Chris Evans, David Furnish, Peter Stringfellow, Girls Aloud, Geri Halliwell, Take That, Jesse Metcalfe and John Terry.

In the end, both teams raised a total of over £1 million for Comic Relief. The girls' team won the competition by raising £774,000 compared to the boys' £286,000. As a result of the girls' team winning, Danny Baker, Piers Morgan, and the boys' team leader Alastair Campbell were put forward to potentially be fired by Sir Alan Sugar. In a heated exchange, Alastair Campbell and Piers Morgan blamed each other for their failure at the task. Sir Alan Sugar decided that Piers Morgan was more at fault due to his "winding people up" with his "demeanor" and consequently 'fired' him.

Jo Brand commented on The Graham Norton Show after the airing of the programme that "Trinny Woodall knows everyone in Belgravia who earns more than £10 million a year so she got on the phone and the rest of us just went to the pub, it was great!"[13]

2009

Another series of Comic Relief Does The Apprentice was aired on 12 and 13 March 2009.[14]

The Apprentice UK

Comic Relief Does The Apprentice

Men's Team

Candidate Claim to fame
Alan Carr - fired Comedian
Jack Dee Comedian
Gerald Ratner - Project Manager Businessman
Jonathan Ross TV and radio presenter
Gok Wan Style guru

Women's Team - Winners

Candidate Claim to fame
Michelle Mone - Project Manager Businesswoman
Patsy Palmer Actress
Fiona Phillips TV presenter
Carol Vorderman TV presenter
Ruby Wax Comedian

The show was filmed in late 2008. Jonathan Ross had been suspended by the BBC for three months for his part in the telephone pranks on Andrew Sachs' regarding Sachs' granddaughter in October and had been forbidden to film anything during that time, however since he had previously agreed and since it was for charity, the BBC allowed him to participate.[15]

Patsy Palmer almost quit the show after a row with fellow contestant Michelle Mone.[16] Sugar expressed disappointment about his portrayal in the BBC trailer for the programme, telling the Daily Mirror, "The idiot that edited it [...] went through the past five years of archive to find snapshots of me roaring like a deranged lunatic and just stuck them all together." He threatened to quit the series if it happened again.[17]

Overview

The task was to create a toy and market it at a show attended by Sir Alan and toy industry representatives, with the potential for it to be mass-produced and sold to raise money for Comic Relief. The men's team, led by Gerald Ratner, created a belt with clip-on slots to hold collectible figurines, that was suggested by Jonathan Ross. The women's team created a velcro suit that was intended to come in pairs and played somewhat like Twister, including a giant novelty dice that when rolled, instructed players to stick one part of their body to the other player's, with the loser being whoever fell to the floor first. Both teams suffered internal conflicts, with Jonathan Ross forcing many of his ideas through and then not contributing to the speech that he was supposed to be writing with Jack Dee, while Patsy Palmer became frustrated with Michelle Mone's leadership of their team and very nearly quit. Conflict between Dee and Ross was presented by the BBC in a humorous fashion, and it is likely that both Dee and Ross 'played up' their conflict to entertain the viewer.

The men's presentation was felt to be better, and Sir Alan told the girls that their product suffered from a myriad of small flaws such as the dice being largely needless, and the suits being in blue and pink when children often prefer to play among their own gender (although the girls pointed out that the prototyping company had made that decision without consulting their team). However, it was pointed out that the collectables for the men's belt would have such high initial production costs that it would require a significant manufacturing lead time and would take an even longer time for the product to generate any profits (and thereby money for Comic Relief), meaning that while the men's execution of their task may have been better than the women's, and their product may have been the better of the two if it were being judged on a purely business basis, as a charity product it was completely worthless for Comic Relief's purposes, meaning that they lost the task. The women's team were "rewarded" by not having to work for Sir Alan any more (and, since this was the final Apprentice charity special, it meant the women's teams had a 100% victory rate across all three editions).

As the men's team lost the contest, one of them was going to be fired by Sir Alan. As project manager, Ratner had to choose 2 of his team to join him in the boardroom to face the board. Ratner decided that Wan and Ross had made the greatest contribution to the team and so should not face the sack. During the deliberations in the board room, Jack Dee attempted to convince Sir Alan to fire his advisor Nick Hewer on the comical grounds that Nick had contributed nothing, and had taken money from Dee and bribed him. While Ratner was heavily criticised for allowing Ross to take over the entire task and bringing Dee back instead of him, Alan Carr was eventually fired by Sir Alan, who felt that Carr had been the least effective contributor to the task and said he was doing Alan a favour by saving him from the miserable atmosphere of the boardroom.

Comic Relief are currently looking into producing the StickStuck product.

Ratings

The first episode of Comic Relief Does The Apprentice 2007 had viewing figures of 6.72 million.

The first episode of Comic Relief Does The Apprentice 2009 had 7.94m (33% share)

See also

References

  1. ↑ BBC One Winter/Spring 2007 — BBC press office
  2. ↑ Comic Relief Does The Apprentice — BBC
  3. ↑ Comic Relief Does the Apprentice — BBC
  4. ↑ Rupert in 'I'm fired' TV shock — The Sun, 16 December 2006
  5. ↑ Weekly Viewing Summary — BARB
  6. ↑ Kombat Opera Presents — BBC
  7. ↑ Red Nose Day 2007 - The Big One — BBC
  8. ↑ Cheryl is a Sugar babe... — The Sun, 15 December 2006
  9. ↑ Everett Quits Reality Show After One Day — Contact Music
  10. ↑ chrismoyles.co.uk
  11. ↑ Last Night's Television — The Times
  12. ↑ Troubled Trinny in tears after Apprentice scuffle — Daily Mail
  13. ↑ Doctor Who reveals what's behind closed (Tardis) doors on The Graham Norton Show — BBC
  14. ↑ In the Firing Line-Up — The Sun, 31 January 2009
  15. ↑
  16. ↑ Nathan, Sara (6 March 2009). "Palmer drama". The Sun (London).
  17. ↑ Nissim, Mayer (25 March 2009). "Sir Alan 'did his nut' over Comic Relief". Digital Spy. Retrieved 25 March 2009.

http://www.express.co.uk/posts/view/203750/Lord-Sugar-says-no-to-celebrity-Apprentice

External links

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