Celebrity Apprentice Gets Rich!

Wanna be the Celebrity Apprentice? It helps
if you bring The Donald a cowboy hat.

Okay, I missed last week's recap. Suffice to say, did anyone think the final two wouldn't come down to Marlee Matlin and John Rich? Lil John acted like he didn't even want to be in the final two and Meat Loaf was just too damn emotional.

The task was to come up with an ad, commercial and concept around 7-Up Retro. Marlee was to base her ad in the 70's with a little help from The Harlem Globetrotters. John Rich had the 80's with Def Leppard. To help them out, several former contestants came back. Team Rich included Lil John, Star Jones and Mark McGrath. Team Matlin had Richard Hatch, LaToya Jackson and Meat Loaf.

Both groups came up with excellent can concepts, both of which will be available soon in a store near you. I enjoyed both commercials as well. Team Matlin had a serious coup when they scored Geoffery Holder for their commercial (the black guy with the white suit and the deep voice that was featured in many of the 7-Up ads in the Seventies). The guys roped in Dee Snider from Twisted Sister for their spot - very 80's.

However, when it comes to executing the event, Team Matlin had the edge. Their event flowed seamlessly and all the members of their team greeted and shmoozed with Trump and the 7-Up execs. Meanwhile, Team Rich didn't greet the VIPs at all. To make matters worse, they started 20 minutes early and Def Leppard hadn't even arrived when John had announced them.

On the bright side, even though this wasn't a fundraising challenge, John Rich managed to collect checks from several participants totalling $275,000. When Marlee Matlin found out about that she was not happy.

However, this was a live 2-hour finale so there was a lot of fluff and reunion mess. To sum it up quickly. Gary Busey is still a nut. Star and Nene still hate each other. The rest of the 'celebs' are still trying to play nice.

If Trump was basing his decision off of this task alone then Marlee had the edge because her event went off without a hitch. Also, if we are looking at body of work, she also raised more money than anyone in Apprentice/Celebrity Apprentice history. Yet, for reasons we may never know, he went with John Rich.

That's okay with me though, because I pegged him to win it all weeks ago and I like to be right!