"People from the public sector often don't get the respect that they
deserve but there's absolutely no reason that I shouldn't stand shoulder to
shoulder with anyone else from the business world," crowed Paula at the
start of last night's Apprentice. And so, with this latest Quote of Doom,
government employees across the land will have sighed with pre-emptive shame
and just watched and waited for Paula to stuff up monumentally.
And so she did. Her team Empire's bath and beauty products ended up containing
the oil equivalent of caviar - Sandalwood - at the price of £750, rather
than Cedarwood which would have been around a fiver or "naff all",
as she said in her Walsall lilt. With Siralan's "costs this, costs that"
obsession, "naff all" was how much of a chance she subsequently
had of survival.
Or was it? Because, to pour more salt in that "public sector" wound,
here was Noorul, whose caption proudly announced him as "Science Teacher"
while he peacocked his credentials. "I'm here to show Sir Alan that I'm
a natural leader and I can drive other people to success" (he'd
obviously been taught to emphasise his verbs in teacher training college).
But, put in charge of team Ignite, he became the antithesis of those "Use
Your Head, Teach" adverts. He was the kid who was too scared to speak
in class, cheeks paler than the whiteboard as he paused, ermed and yeahed
his colleagues into a dynamism-free zone.
To be fair, both teams' product development meetings were banal. Asked to
select from a list of "natural" products, Paula purred randomly "I
like seaweed", while Philip (on Noorul's team) over-enthused: "apples
are awesome!" But presumably they had little choice over their
selections - for it was seaweed (Paula stuck with it) and honey (Noorul
managed to stutter the word in a brief hiatus from his fear-induced coma)
that had the highest filmability factor. Apple gathering just wouldn't have
looked or sounded as pretty as Empire's day at the coast or Ignite wrestling
with bees. To a backdrop of yacht shots and sea gull sounds, James yelped: "I'm
knee-deep in crab shit" (he wasn't - he was just consolidating his
position as Moaner In Chief). Meanwhile, down at the honey farm, in full
beekeeping gear, Lorraine ran like a girl as the swarms reluctantly
surrendered their honeycomb.
Noorul issued some stuttered, incomplete orders from the product development
lab - but he was already broken. Sniffing fragrance sampler sticks, he
looked as if he wanted to be inhaling something much stronger - something
that would send him to an oblivion from which he wouldn't wake until Adrian
Chiles mopped his brow in the You're Fired studio. Noorul couldn't answer
anything and his team was imploding - Philip and Kimberly fighting over who
had more balls and who could grow even more. Lorraine called Philip a "dick'ead"
(dropping the 'h' gives the word more impact).
But thankfully they were saved by Paula and Yasmina, in the Empire lab, in a
farce that almost sang itself: "You say Sandalwood, I say Cedarwood.
Cedar. Sandal. Cedar. Sandal. Let's mess the whole thing up." Come now
girls, no need for confusion, the difference between the two is only £1200
per kilo for sandal, compared to £26 per kilo for cedar. Who's arguing?
Nick's raised eyebrow went unnoticed and we soon cut to Yasmina pouring
Sandalwood into the formula as liberally as if it were chip fat on offer
from Netto.
And finally, Nick got to put that raised eyebrow into words. He became Cilla
Black on her worst ever day at the Surprise Surprise office. No long-lost
Uncle John from Australia waiting in the wings tonight. Oh no. Just the
secret he'd been aching to reveal: "Would it surprise you to know that
you've spent over £700 on that?"
Gawps, grimaces, and attributions of guilt all round, while Paula put the
mistake in her own earthily expressive terms: "We have absolutely shit
out massively". But there she was straight afterwards, tenderly
wrapping up her little disasters in enough pretty labels, green tissue paper
and straw ties to make it hurt less, and wearing balls enough to put the
prices up. Nothing deterred her and her team - even when, having spent the
budget of a small country on perfume, they found that their pitch was next
to a German Hotdog van. "Would you like to smell our shower gel to make
up for those onions?" James wryly asked one passer by.
Across town, Noorul's team were getting giddy from desperation. They donned
their beekeeper costumes as a sales gimmick. Did they learn nothing from
week two's toga party? The oversize white body suits and black masks gave
them all the cool of Bill Turnbull and a portent of lurking danger akin to
the Beemen of the Apocalypse. Lorraine came top on sheer selling dementia,
resembling Matt Lucas in his Shooting Stars romper suit as she charged
around yelling "Bubble Bath!" in staccato and later, increasingly
possessed by the bee theme, "have you been Buzzed?!"
Noorul, surprise, sold nothing. I even stepped up Noorul Suicide Watch when I
heard his sales patter: "You can actually taste the honey if you get it
in your mouth by accident". The fragrance sticks hadn't spirited him
away, so was he now going to attempt drowning in his own bubbles? Sod it, he
thought. Having earlier refused to cut prices, he suddenly put everything at
a crazy 3 for £1 - not even chip fat from Netto is that cheap.
But Paula saved him with her second Quote of Doom. High on the huge sales that
her team had achieved (and possibly onion fumes) she announced: "We
made a brilliant product - we're in the running now". Oh Paula, tatty
bye.
Everybody seemed to know that Noorul's victory was a joke - not least Sir
Alan, who awarded a joke prize - a sushi and sake night. The words "we
absolutely destroyed the other team" increased in comic value as Ignite
slurped some gack-looking pink stuff from conical flasks and waved strips of
raw fish at each other. It's hardly a private show by Katherine Jenkins now,
is it?
The other joke that's emerging? My sweepstake pick, Ben. What a plonker,
loudly removing himself from any responsibility, claiming that his Sandhurst
scholarship makes that OK. And, during the soap making section, you could
clearly see his pants. How awful that I once thought I actually had a good
chance of winning the office sweepstake with this goon. If I do triumph, my
prize goes straight to the Benevolent Fund for the Re-education of
Overconfident Boys.
Next week's show promises to be a corker - it's the one where they have to
film an advert for a product they've invented. This year's it's cereal to
last year's tissues - oh that classic episode where Raef got all Spielberg
with Sian Lloyd. If they even come close to that I will be a happy
Apprentice watcher. The teaser tells of Sir Alan sacking someone because the
ad is more an inappropriate comedy sketch than kid-friendly fodder. And what
with Ben's record on unseemly bottom slapping, I do hope that's the sounds
of him falling on his own (he'd argue, very impressive) sword.
