Game Show NewsNet - The Apprentice: Martha Stewart

Mixed Greens - October 20

Last week on The Apprentice: Martha Stewart, Matchstick lost for the 4th time in a row!

Rather than waiting until the next morning, Martha has her receptionist Julia call the candidates the same evening Dawn is fired. Everyone has to go to the conference room immediately. Martha has decided to reorganize the teams. [Yeah, I’m sure the producers had nothing to do with it. ;)]

Martha asks which Primarius members haven’t been project managers. Ryan, Jennifer and Sarah raise their hands. Martha has Ryan and Jennifer pick new teams. Jennifer chooses Howie, Ryan chooses Dawna, Jennifer chooses Sarah, Ryan chooses Amanda, Jennifer chooses Carrie, Ryan chooses Leslie, Jennifer chooses Bethany, Ryan chooses David, Jennifer chooses Jim [insert evil laugh here], Ryan chooses Marcela. Jennifer is the project manager of the new Primarius Team, while Ryan becomes project manager of the new Matchstick Team.

The candidates all come back to the loft. Ryan says that he didn’t want Jim on his team because he causes conflict. Jim tells everyone on the new Primarius that they have the strongest player on their team, him. Jim confesses that he is the most desperate person in the loft; he has to win because he wants to make a better life for his family. [Suicide is an option, Jim.]

Ryan tells Marcela that she was picked last because he doesn’t know her. He says that he has heard that she does what she is asked, but doesn’t go “above and beyond.” Marcela is glad that the teams were reshuffled because now she will have an opportunity to show what she’s got.

Martha waxes euphoric about the concept of teamwork and how important it is for building a business.

The next morning, Julia calls the candidates and tells them that Martha has “business” in Bedford [no doubt she has to give her big black horses massages] and so she will be contacting them by video at 9:00 a.m.

Martha is working in her kitchen when she contacts them. She has something big and black and limp in her hand, it looks like some sort of lettuce. She tells the candidates that one of her favorite things to do is create new salad dressings. She talks about her childhood and how her mother took her to the grocery store and bought her first jar of salad dressing, called “Wishbone.” Martha goes on to plug Wishbone, saying that they have been in business for 50 years and that they have revenues in excess of $300,000,000 per year. [That’s a freakin’ huge amount of salad!]

Martha tells each group that their task is to create their own salad dressing for Wishbone, design their own packaging and then sell their new creations at one of two Stew Leonard’s locations. [http://www.stewleonards.com/] The team that sells the most wins, the team that sells the least will be sending somebody home. And in huge non-sequitur news: Martha tells the teams that the lettuce that she is touching was grown on her farm in Bedford and she would love a new salad dressing to dress it with. Jim tells Martha that he loves her as everyone laughs.

Matchstick immediately went to New Jersey to the Wishbone Test Kitchen to start making their salad dressing. Ryan tells Marcela to come up with something on her own, since she is a professional chef. He says that he “wouldn’t tell the Pope how to pray, so he wouldn’t tell Marcela how to cook.” Marcela says that Bethenny, who is on the other team, has more experience as a chef, so she is worried. She comes up with a Latin-style salad dressing with scallions, onions, cilantro and cumin. The teams love the taste but says that it looks “too green.” Dawna says that it looks like vomit. She goes on to say that it looks like something you might find in a healthfood store, something that you would have to plug your nose to drink. Dawna says that due to the result, she felt that Marcela had to be watched and that she couldn’t be allowed to come up with something on her own.

Over at Primarius, Jennifer organizes the team. She decided that each teammate would be given a task based on who is most suited to it. Jim is assigned the label. Bethenny will create the dressing. Bethenny says that she is a natural foods chef and that although she loves Marcela, “she can’t touch her in the kitchen.” Bethenny goes for an “Asian Vinaigrette” dressing. Her dressing includes honey, lemon, rice wine Vinaigrette, wasabi, ginger, onions, white wine vinegar, olive oil, sesame oil, a bit of peanut butter, garlic, and her team loves the way that it tastes.

Back at Matchstick, the team is still tinkering with the recipe. The team doesn’t want a Latin flavor to their dressing, they want something that appeals to more people. They decide on a “Rosemary Lime Vinaigrette.”

Matchstick sells their product for $3.49 and offers samples at the Stew Leonard’s in Yonkers, NY. The shoppers in the store love the product and the men love interacting with Marcela, who is doing a great job selling her creation.

Primarius sells their Asian Vinaigrette at a Stew Leonard’s in Connecticut. They sell their dressing for $3.99, which is high for Wishbone Salad Dressing. Jim tries to sell product and is completely obnoxious in his sales pitch: “Try before you die,” or “Massage it on your wife’s feet,” or “It’s been known to cure warts.” Project Manager Jennifer just watches as he makes a fool out of himself. Sarah says that he is embarrassing and she just wishes that he would disappear. A customer overhears Jim saying that the other team doesn’t have the “f*cking balls” to price their product high. She goes to the manager of the store, talks about the comment along with his foot massage comment and says that he is very vulgar. The store manager says that if there are any more complaints the team will not be allowed to sell any more bottles of dressing. Jim doesn’t let up and his teammates can only stand by and roll their eyes.

Over at Matchstick, Leslie is selling too hard. She places extra bottles of the dressing in people’s shopping carts and the customers are leaving their unwanted salad dressings around the store. Even Charles [wandering around the store with his trademark phallic cigar] finds salad dressings to return to the team. [They are like Tribbles and start showing up everywhere.] About 40 extra bottles showed up, so the team has to sell their dressing even harder.

At Primarius, Jennifer says that she intended upon pulling Jim back, but she was afraid of his reaction. Alexis says that she doesn’t know what Jennifer is doing, she doesn’t see her controlling Jim.

In the conference room, each team talks about their dressing. Primarius sold 391 bottles of their $3.99 bottles of Asian Vinaigrette for a total of $1560.09. Matchstick sold 453 bottles of their Rosemary Lime Vinaigrette for $3.49 each for a total of $1580.97. Matchstick wins by a $20.00 difference. The winning team gets to go on the Letty G schooner and the losers go to the conference room.

Martha sees the winning team off on their evening cruise. She asks if everyone is warm enough: if not, she has a blanket in her car. She says that she is sorry that she can’t go too. [Her parole officer probably didn’t want her leaving dry land.]

Primarius talks about their loss. Jim tries to convince everyone that Jennifer deserves to leave. He designed the label and sold 20% of the product. Carrie says that she would rather have Jennifer on her team because she wouldn’t kill her in her sleep, but agrees the Jim did more for the team. Jim threatens his teammates saying that they are either his ally or his enemy and that if they go against him, they will pay. Howie warns Jim that he needs to stop threatening him.

In the conference room, Jennifer says that Bethenny did a fabulous job creating the dressing and that Jim did a good job on the label. Martha says that the team didn’t make a connection with the customer. Sarah makes the comment that Jim was out of line in his sales pitch. Martha wonders why Jennifer didn’t keep Jim behind the scenes. While Martha is chastising Jennifer, Jim is acting like a total nutjob, but Martha doesn’t seem to care [Did the producers tell her to keep Jim since he makes good television?] Martha tells Jennifer that she should have been selling since “Jim has a history of being overly aggressive, overly enthusiastic, overly verbal, dah, dah dah.” [Jim repeats the dah dah dahs.] Martha tells Jennifer that she is a D.A. and that she should be able to control Jim. Jim says that Martha probably has 10,000 Jennifers in her organization and very few Jims. Martha guffaws, “There might be a good reason for that.” Jennifer says that “Jim said ‘When Martha looks into the mirror, she sees me.’ I find it hard to believe that when you look in the mirror you see a raving lunatic.”

Martha decides that she only needs to see Jennifer and Jim and sends the rest of the group back up to the loft. Charles says that “they are dealing with a nut on one hand and a poor manager on the other. Jennifer has winners on her team, but lost.”

Martha says, “At Martha Stewart Living Omnimedia, we have a lot of different types of people working ,we have entirely creative people, they behave creatively and think creatively, but they are nice.” Martha says that Jim flies off the handle too much. Jim says that he his fighting for his life in the game. Martha says that it isn’t a game, it’s a job interview, it’s serious. Jim and Jennifer snipe back and forth about who is the better person. Martha says that Jennifer didn’t do a good job managing the team. Jim’s behavior was inappropriate on the floor. Martha says that she doesn’t respect Jennifer for being afraid to pull Jim off the sales floor. “How can you be afraid of somebody who is working for you?” Martha says, “Jennifer you are just not working for me.”

Martha says that it’s more interesting to have a live-wire around than a poor manager. She writes her letter:

“Dear Jennifer,
Thank you for being an ‘Apprentice’ candidate. I hope that you found it to be an interesting diversion from you job. We’re sorry that it didn’t work out. We wish you well. Travel safely.

Cordially,
Martha Stewart.”

[The letters are getting shorter, pretty soon its going to be “See ya’, Wouldn’t want to be ya!”]