Tuesday, May 12, 2009

With Donald Trump it is the Art of the Deal; with Joan Rivers it is the Art of the Spiel

Well, let me admit it—I don’t like Joan Rivers…don’t like her insipid daughter either. And after the Celebrity Apprentice, both of them need a good throat throttling along with “the Donald.”

Donald Trump is an interesting person, to say the least. He has made two unfair decisions within this past month. One was a question in the Miss USA Contest that was directed at Ms. California to answer. That story will be for another time. This is about his Celebrity Apprentice show and his final decision that was perhaps good for his business, but nevertheless, unfair.

I watched the show all season just to see how people handle the assignments and handle the stress. They always amaze me. I am hooked into certain reality shows like Dancing With the Stars, American Idol to name a few.

The Celebrity Apprentice finally ended Sunday night and the final show dragged on for two hours. I wanted to see if Trump was going to make the right decision, the fair one—hiring Annie Duke. He didn’t. He picked Joan Rivers, the nastiest and most hateful person I have seen on a reality show ever. Her daughter, Melissa Rivers, was on the show too and also came across as a liar and a spoiled, shrill brat even calling Annie and her team “whore pit vipers” and “fucking whores.” But when Joan called Annie a “white trash poker player,” and said that her friends were in the "Mafia," that was the last straw. Joan and Melissa have perfected their disgusting act. Neither Joan nor Mellisa are funny and totally over the edge of decency and decorum.

Who has ever heard of Annie Duke? She is a professional poker player, good looking and very smart. She played the Celebrity game with class, and professionalism. She tackled each assignment to win not realizing that she was playing against Joan Rivers, the biggest viper of all. Some thought she micro-managed. I didn't. They accused Annie of being arrogant when all she was doing was taking charge to ensure success but it was Joan who had the audacity to even correct Annie's grammar on the final episode. If you are the Project Manager, you are responsible for the outcome.

Joan assessed early on that Annie was the one to beat. The only way she could finally come out on top (because Annie won all her assignments as Project Manager and raised the most money for charity) was to defame and denigrate her. And she did that to perfection. I mean, this is TV reality; that’s what they do and it all seems to be getting worse. That was her strategy from the beginning…knock out the strongest contestant with the big lies, calling her worse than Hitler, and then sail in on her comedic fame. She is 75 years old and certainly has perfected playing the mean and nasty role. At the Academy Awards pre-show years ago she used to tear people apart when it came to their taste in clothes. It is her "style" and what got her to where she is today.

It just goes to show that some people can’t get beyond “celebrity.” Several people said that Joan Rivers was a role model, even Trump. She was not. What I think they meant to say was that she, at her age, was an inspiration-- that people could continue to work and achieve at any age and that being older should not be a deterrent to success. She would not have lasted two seconds in any board room in America as Annie suggested.

Annie lost the game by not considering that someone could win by lying, maligning her character and going completely over the top with an assassination unbefitting anyone much less a 75 year old woman and an audience egging her on. Annie didn't read the cards correctly. There were no poker faces to figure out. She countered the Joan Rivers personal attacks by trying to win honestly with an opponent who was vicious beyond imagination. She, in my opinion, won the game in every respect. She just didn't have the same sort of "celebrity" that Joan Rivers has.

And for Donald, well, it is called “Celebrity Apprentice.” No one in their right mind would have hired Joan Rivers in the real world but this TV reality show is all about the buck to him and as he would probably say, everything is fair when it comes to business and people are expendable. That is why this “reality show” is not reality and therefore just show biz.The only thing that Donald Trump did for himself by hiring that viper was to ensure that he would not be personally attacked for the next year by her. Always keep in mind the art of the deal. It's playing the game and all of us who watched this show got played.

The biggest loser? Me, for watching it and probably spending way too much time writing about it.

No comments: