Culture:
Reality and Rewards
Although Reality TV is waning in popularity,
The Apprentice still draws a huge audience.
Martin Saunders explores why our
fascination with the series remains...
Reality TV is a bit passé. Watching
wannabe D-listers pottering around
a house for three months was once
a pastime for millions – now Big
Brother has been relegated to a
slot on Channel Five. In the early
noughties, a raft of shows offering
instant fame to anyone prepared to
behave disgracefully for a camera
were gobbled up eagerly by a
celebrity-obsessed public. Now, tired
of repetitive formats and a little wiser,
culture seems to have moved on.
One fly-on-the-wall show, however,
has survived that wind change
impressively. Like
Big Brother, it
invites a group of strangers to move
into a house full of cameras; like
I’m
a Celebrity… it puts them through
gruelling challenges for our macabre
viewing pleasure. Yet the BBC’s
The
Apprentice is marked by a couple of
differences: first, it aspires to have
at least a little class, and second, the
prize on offer isn’t simply fame for
fame’s sake – it’s a genuine business
relationship with Lord Alan Sugar. As a
result, while other ‘reality’ programmes
are having the plug pulled,
The
Apprentice remains one of the most
talked about shows on television.
Pursuit of Victory
Now in its seventh series, the show’s
prize of a chance to become Lord
Sugar’s apprentice has now morphed
into the opportunity to become his
business partner although the popular
format has remained intact. We still
have 16 candidates, drawn from
a limited cross section of society
(ethnically diverse yes, but mainly
degree-holders with a business
background); they still divide into two
teams each week, and compete in tasks
for the chance to avoid a boardroom
date with Lord Sugar. And of course, if
you end up on the losing team, ‘one of
you will get fired’.
The relentless pursuit of victory
seems to bring out the very worst
in the contestants, and that’s saying
something. Even in their opening
statements – filmed before the series
begins – we catch them offering such
bizarre sentiments as ‘My first word
wasn’t “Mummy”, it was “money”’
and ‘Don’t tell me the sky’s the limit
when there are footprints on the
moon.’ As they begin the process, the
candidates seem so highly charged with
self-important impetus you half expect
one of them to start pronouncing
themselves the messiah. And as each
series plays out, we see the same
behaviours emerging time and again:
name-calling, back-covering, sometimes
even barefaced lying.
In the last series, one-man pompous
quote machine Stuart Baggs famously
claimed to run a ‘fully licensed telecoms
business’ in the Isle of Man. Far
from being the influential media
magnate he had wanted to portray,
Baggs was actually offering simple
Internet services on a limited
licence. The lie was to be Baggs’
downfall – they caused Lord Sugar
to realise that his trust of the
young man had been misplaced.
Real Treasure
Moments like this transform a
process-based business show into
must-see TV. We are compelled
to watch because we know every
show will produce a handful of
genuine water cooler moments,
springing from the pratfalls of the
hapless contestants. We laugh not
only because the pressure of their
situation causes them to make
ridiculous mistakes, but because of
the contrast between the glorious
version of themselves which they
proclaimed at the start of the show,
and the error-ridden reality.
Kevin Shaw, a contestant in
Series Four, was one of the most
eager to discuss his wealth and
achievements as the show began.
Aged 24, he already had the
country pile and the Porsche, he
smugly pronounced in his initial
statement, but his money had
clearly gone to his head. On a foodbased
task, he insisted on being his
team’s head chef on the grounds: ‘I
regularly eat at Italian restaurants.’
He was fired soon afterwards.
The people who succeed on
the programme, such as Series
Six winner Stella English, have
demonstrated that they have the
skills to match the sales patter; the
business mind that moves them
from reality TV star to bona fide
Sugar acolyte. Ultimately, the
self-promoting, back-stabbing
desperation for success at any cost
leads nowhere – which is, of course,
a kingdom principle. The show
is a perfect illustration of Paul’s
assertion in 1 Timothy 6:10 that
‘the love of money is a root of all
kinds of evil’.
Having said that,
The
Apprentice does reward those who
are motivated by money, with the
chance to earn lots of it. Its message
that wealth, power, and career
success are traits to be admired
seems to stand in stark opposition
to what Jesus said and modelled. ‘It
is easier for a camel to go through
the eye of a needle than for a rich
man to enter the kingdom of God’,
he said (Mark 10:25). When we
look at the cut-throat world of the
City, where ethics and justice are
most definitely not priorities, it isn’t
hard to see what he meant.
Under the Microscope
Central to
The Apprentice and
its enduring appeal is Lord Alan
Sugar, the ultimate barrow-boymade-
good. Acting as judge and
jury not only over the candidates’
business performance but also
their ethics and character, he is
straight-talking, firm, but also
remarkably fair. His one-liners are
often so quick-witted they could
be scripted. And while we may
sometimes disagree with his final
verdicts, the audience is always
with him, this strange, fearless and
genuine millionaire everyman. He
is devastating in his assessment of
failure, but he is also generous in
the light of a job well done.
As each series progresses
towards a conclusion, we are able
to join with Lord Sugar in affirming
those moments of quality from the
contestants – a great presentation,
a brilliant winning idea – which
demonstrate positive aspirations.
The cream rises to the top; the more
arrogant candidates have either
changed or long been fired.
Yet these later stages are not
the reason why
The Apprentice
is enduring where other reality
TV shows are flagging. We – and
by this I don’t mean Christians
– love the show because it puts
warped modern values under the
microscope and exposes their folly.
It is about dismantling
arrogance; replacing self-obsession
with teamwork; exposing backstabbing
and punishing deceit.
‘I haven’t got room for someone
like that in my organisation’, Lord
Sugar often says, and we are with
him – there is no room for these
values in the world we’d like to
live in.
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