This week’s episode of the longest show on television, Celebrity Apprentice was not only the most anyone has ever mentioned restaurant chain, Medieval Times on television, since their ubiquitous ads in the 90s, but was also an ad for the Real Housewives franchise.
This is unsurprising considering Real Housewives of New Jersey cast-member, Teresa Giudice‘s presence on the cast and NBC’s ownership of the Bravo network. While, it made sense for the women’s team, Forte, to pick the ‘Un-Real Housewives of Camelot’ as their theme for their 15 minute Medieval Times show (this week’s assignment), it all felt a little dirty, especially when Aubrey O’Day excitedly announced the Real Housewives had “like, 5 million viewers.”
CLICK THE CONTINUE READING BUTTON TO READ THE REST!
Adding a little more Bravo synergy to the mix, was the addition of, Inside The Actors Studio host, James Lipton, as guest adviser, to guide the teams through their transformations into medieval knights and jesters. The men’s team, led by Penn Jillette, due to his Vegas experience, took a much more straight-forward turn. Penn announced that his goal was to showcase the talents of each of his team-mates and make sure everyone in the audience knew who they were and why they were famous, from Clay Aiken’s singing to George Takei’s past on Star Trek.
It was all very fair and charitable, and ran almost opposite of how the women’s team managed their production. Lisa Lampanelli took on the lead as project manager, and she did not allow herself to be talked over or interrupted like Patricia Velasquez did, in last week’s episode. She very quickly made a “no interruptions” rule and exploded in the costume room when all the women couldn’t stop talking over each other. While, everyone agreed that the housewives theme was a great idea, Dayana Mendoza seemed more concerned there was nothing for kids to enjoy, but no one was more upset about this project than Victoria Gotti.
Given her crew of actresses and other performers, Lisa quickly cast everyone into roles, except for Victoria, who she hired as stage director since she needed the “toughest” person there to be able to call those shots. Victoria took this to mean she “didn’t have” a task and acted like a petulant child, even refusing to take her bag off while the women were training on how to sword fight. The icing on the cake came when Lisa asked her to google something, and she spelled “medieval” as “mid-evil.” This is despite the fact that this word was all over the room, even on the stationery right in front of her.
The men’s team was drama-free, with one tiny exception. George Takei, bless him, messed up his lines during rehearsal, and Clay Aiken was just not going to take that. It was a very minor bump in the road especially when you watch the women’s rehearsal and realized Victoria didn’t even have the right script to program in the light cues. Dayana attempted to voice her opinion on this, but was told to go and be pretty by Aubrey and Lisa, as this was the only thing she was apparently good for.
The shows go on, and it’s clear that the men made the right decision by going for broad comedy and easy laughs, with Dee Snider dressing in drag and Clay bursting into song. The comedy, full of broads, on the women’s team is good, but with all the kids in the audience, it’s possible most of the jokes just went over their heads. The ladies were scantily clad and even had to blur out the naughty bits of Debbie Gibson and Tia Carrere, who had some wardrobe malfunctions as they jostled in the arena. What did they think, Medieval Times was going to be frequented by a bunch of dudes?
If their goal was to sway the opinions of the Donalds in the boardroom, it totally worked, because when it came time to go over the team’s performance, neither of them could stop drooling over the women’s looks. In the boardroom, the cracks in the men’s team finally started to show themselves: Penn picked George and Lou Ferrigno as the two teammates he would put on the chopping block, and Lou completely lost it at Penn. This is after Penn was complimentary and classy in how he singled them out, making it clear he was only doing it because he was being forced to by Donald.
The women took three giant steps backwards for womankind with their emotional, catty behavior in the boardroom. Everyone turned on Lisa and began to air their frustrations with her concept, as if they all hadn’t agreed to it just days earlier. Immediately, Victoria and Dayana get singled out as the potential firings, with Victoria and Lisa going in circles about her task and its worth. The only person who remained silent was Teresa Giudice, who was the real winner of this episode, since the show was basically done as an homage to her “legacy” on pop culture. Surprisingly, Teresa acted humble and reserved throughout the entire thing, but was quick to remind us, upon questioning, that she “attacks when attacked.” We know, Teresa. Trust us.
As I saw coming from miles away, the men won this week’s challenge, and Penn got to take home $40,000 for his charity, Opportunity Village. In the firing squad, Lisa got very fired up over how far she’s come as a female comedian, and I have to say that it did move me. I’m not made of stone, people!
Victoria Gotti ended up being fired (what happened to the supposed blowup she said she had with Teresa?) for her non-stop whining and bad attitude, and Dayana got another shot to prove herself next week.
TELL US: DID YOU AGREE WITH THIS WEEK’S FIRING? WHICH SHOW DID YOU PREFER, THE WOMEN’S OR THE MEN’S? WHEN DO YOU THINK THE REAL TERESA WILL EMERGE? ARE YOU TEAM VICTORIA OR TEAM LISA?
