Category: TV, Radio, Audio

Slate published an article today, written by Producer Bill Pruit. It’s a behind-the-scenes look at The Apprentice and the subsequent cult of personality it created with clever editing, flashy production, and seemingly earnest, eager contestants willing to do anything to get a chance to work alongside the guy with his name on all the buildings. 

It probably doesn’t come as a surprise that the revelations of the article reveal Donald J. Trump’s toxicity, racism, sexism and narcissism. We’ve all seen these traits on international display, including Trump’s proclivity for insults, retribution and sadism. It doesn’t surprise me at all to learn that he flippantly used slurs, including the “N word,” especially after what he did to the “Central Park Five.”

No, none of this “new information” surprises me. 

What does surprise me is the longevity of The Apprentice. Mark Burnett unquestionably has the secret sauce for long-run “reality” shows. Despite little tweaks to the Survivor game and casting, it’s still the same format as it was 24 years ago when it was novel. And people still watch it and want to be on it. 

But The Apprentice was a different animal. 

In 2004, I tuned in because I liked the concepts — the challenge of creating and championing a product or service; how to target and hone its marketing; how to hustle; how to multitask; how to work as a team; how to defend your decisions and your work; and how to ensure your own survival in a cut-throat business environment. 

But as an astute watcher from the beginning, I almost immediately spotted a pattern from week to week and across the first few seasons: Donald Trump was a lousy businessman. That fact played out in the real world over decades. He notoriously leveraged the bankruptcy courts to stiff vendors and employees, while preserving what empire remained. He published a bestseller he hadn’t written, and according to the ghostwriter, he likely never read. He cut corners, grifted, sold people inferior products, and cheated at every turn.

He is one of the few — if not the only — casino owners who actually lost money on those enterprises. That’s an astounding feat of failure.

And it became clear as he sat center stage at The Apprentice’s ominously illuminated conference room table, that he lacked even the most fundamental business insights. From week to week, he showed glaring inconsistencies in those principles — favoring honesty one week, rewarding deceit the next; espousing the virtues of creativity in one episode, only to scold the most out-of-the-box thinking the next. 

In most episodes, it seemed that it didn’t matter how the contestants performed their tasks; who stayed and who got fired appeared more about who made the best television for one more week — or, even more cynically, how they looked.

Trump himself shined only in the moments when he was doing what he does best — grilling people, shaming them, making them grovel and beg, and of course stoking his own ego. And that made for good reality drama for a while, but I think for actual business people, it fizzled quickly. It certainly did for me, and I tuned out after a few seasons — annoyed that I’d invested as much time as I had in the show.

The Celebrity Apprentice, which ultimately replaced the original format, extended the show’s life by virtue of well-known contestants and a charity payout. But the fundamental problem with the show endured: Trump was an unpredictable, bloviating showman, but not an executive of any measurable caliber.