The Apprentice

For the landmark 117^th post of Just One More Episode, I’ll be returning not only to the recently talked-about topic of programmes I don’t watch (like Naked Attraction) but also to the rarely covered theme of programmes I actively hate (Altered Carbon).  While this blog has mostly remained a safe space of positivity about all the different boxsets out there (with a healthy dose of my own self-obsession), this week we are turning our smarmy observations and cutting critiques to the absolute pile of dross that is The Apprentice.  A fifteenth series has slipped onto air this month to a collective shrug of indifference and I’m happy to say I feel no need whatsoever to catch a single episode.  Part of this is now down to the fact I’ve reached the stage of flat ownership where I can have friends round for dinner (especially ones that invite themselves), so I’m too busy serving up Viennetta as a feasible dessert option to tune into this BBC flagship production.  So, eighties ice cream products aside, let’s go through the reasons why The Apprentice should be stricken from the TV guide.  And just to recap quickly the premise for anyone who’s never grasped it, this show is, in short, competitive job interviewing.  Yes, really.

It’s reality TV but pretends not to be

During the first few series from 2005 onwards, this programme’s biggest crime (against my personal view of what’s wrong and what’s right) was to provide a route to reality TV for viewing snobs that claimed not to be able to tolerate the genre.  “Big Brother!” they would cry, “I can’t be watching that bunch of wannabes desperate to be famous.  But have you seen The Apprentice?”  I would sneer at them, pointing out they should just own the pleasure they take in consuming trash TV.  If you never miss an episode of Keeping Up With The Kardashians or Love Island then you might as well own that behaviour.  Anyone who judges you for it isn’t important.  Yet The Apprentice legitimised our natural interest in watching ordinary people humiliate themselves by dressing itself up in the pinstripes of actual business.  A tenuous link to product development, sales, marketing and boardroom practices suddenly meant that it was highbrow to watch 20-year-olds from Essex slag each other off while desperately trying to stay on the telly as long as possible.  Frankly, unforgiveable dishonesty.

The stupid tasks

Each week’s episode is themed around an industry, whether confectionary, fashion, events or some combination of all three to make cold hard cash.  A common trope of reality TV is to get people to showcase a skill but with the added pressure of an unfeasibly short period of time in which to do so (Great British Bake Off’s timed technical challenges, or the matter of days allowed to master a Quickstep in Strictly Come Dancing).  But somehow, The Apprentice stretches this too far by making ill-matched groups of applicants think up, refine, manufacture, distribute, market and sell a product within mere moments.  If this wasn’t enough of a recipe for failure, you need to factor in that the all team members are working against each other, with their interests vested in making everyone but themselves look as incompetent as possible.  What ensues are montages of the contestants, dressed in their best banker-wear, running around London streets doing everything wrong before a classic bollocking in the boardroom.

Stupid Lord Sugar

Enter (from a tiny door in the middle of the room, presumably coming from some sort of subterranean troll hole) Lord Sugar, the man whose apprentice these people are supposed to want to be.  Apparently he’s done well in big business, but he doesn’t strike me as someone dynamic enough to thrive in 2019’s brutal economy.  His furrowed brow thinly muffles the sounds of his mind whirring as he dodderily computes what’s said to him.  Fair enough, what’s being said is normally an accusatory argument between a handful of competitive business wannabes, but it all seems a bit much.  Relishing his own interruptions, our Alan then wheels out dad-gags that I swear have been written and fed to him by a team of eighties comedians.  Or sugar-jacked ten-year-olds.  If he announced “Well you’re a stupid poo poo head” to someone I don’t imagine a single eyebrow would rise in in surprise.  But that’s the thing about interviewing: best practice is to put the candidate at ease.  Instead, Sugar rules by fear and intimidation, pointing rudely and mistakenly firing people before he’s even employed them.  The apprentices might be inane, but I would feel more comfortable watching them judge him for his contributions to humanity.

The stupid contestants

This is a bit harsh as my only point of reference here has been the odd one that’s ended up on Celebrity Big Brother.  James Hill was actually a top lad, and I was even won over by Katie Hopkins in the house, watching her reason carefully with Katie Price in a way that betrayed a side to her which today’s unacceptable media persona has shat all over.  The rest come across as officewear-clad interns that talk a big game about their skills but end up set up for failure by each week’s task.  One thing I’ve learned in my working life is that nobody ever looks good blaming someone else, and yet these people sit in front of Sugar pointing fingers at poor old Jenny for not selling enough soap.  Maybe squabbling children is what’s missing from the world of professional behaviour, but it has me reaching for the remote.

Its crimes against humanity

Our UK version is based on an original US iteration that first gave a platform to Donald Trump.  This says it all.

Phone abuse

We’ll look back at The Apprentice UK’s most significant contribution to culture: holding the iPhone below your chin while talking on speaker.  This action became characteristic during the contestants’ various wild goose chases, coordinating errand teams sabotaging the overall effort on the sly.  Now it’s taken hold on the top deck of many of London’s buses, which is great if you want to be involved in other people’s banal chitter chatter.  Similarly, the tension of each episode’s climactic boardroom scene is supposedly elevated by a receptionist using the world’s oldest landline to tell the nervously waiting applicants as and when Sugar is summoning them to his shiny boardroom for some more showing off.  This all needs to stop.

In summary then, for those that might have missed the nuance, I really do take exception to this show.  It’s trash masquerading as premium, a theme that runs through the whole operation, from the contestants to Captain Sugar himself.  I don’t mind lots of showing off, but once someone’s screamed “look at me!” long enough to get your attention, they should have something interesting to tell you.  This is never the case in The Apprentice.  I don’t watch it, and I don’t like it.  Of course, loyal readers, you’re free to make your own decisions, just like Sugar is free of UK employment law in order to make his own hires.  But just be honest with yourself: you’re watching it because you like trash.