Andrew Dice Clay lived up to his reputation as one to never hold back his thoughts, no matter how inappropriate they may be, causing the comedian and former Dice Undisputed star to become the first candidate fired by Donald Trump during last night's NBC broadcast of The Celebrity Apprentice's second-season premiere.
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The Celebrity Apprentice's second-season premiere episode began with The Donald arriving at the USS Intrepid -- a retired Navy battleship located in midtown Manhattan -- on a private helicopter to meet with the 16 celebrities that, like the show's first installment, would be competing on the behalf of their favorite charitable causes instead of a position working in Trump's organization.
"We are going to be doing battle," Trump told the celebrities. "Let me tell you, this ship has been in many, many battles, and it won everyone of them, and that's what it's all about, winning. And in this case, you win for charity."
Trump then divided the teams according to sex and sent them to Trump Tower to come up with their team name and their project manager.
The female team -- consisting of LPGA golfer Natalie Gulbis; professional poker player Annie Duke; Deal or No Deal suitcase model Claudia Jordan; Keeping up with the Kardashians star Khloe Kardashian; comedienne Joan Rivers and her daughter, former I'm a Celebrity - Get Me Out of Here! contestant Melissa Rivers; actress/model and former Fear Factor contestant Brande Roderick; and TLC music group member Tionne "T-Boz" Watkins -- wasted no time in naming Joan as the project manager because of her status as the oldest member on the team.
"I'm the only one in there without a tampon in my pocketbook so they just deferred to me," she quipped later.
After tossing around team names such as "Phoenix," and "Ballbusters," the team took a liking to Annie's suggestion that they name themselves "Athena," after the Greek Goddess of wisdom and the "more disciplined side of war."
The male team -- consisting of Andrew; country singer Clint Black; comedian Tom Green; Olympic figure skating champion and former Skating with Celebrities judge Scott Hamilton; former Monster Garage star Jesse James; R&B singer Brian McKnight; retired NBA basketball player and former Celebrity Mole Yucatan winner Dennis Rodman; and retired NFL football player Herschel Walker -- were somewhat less organized in their decision-making. After tossing around team names such as "VIP Enterprises" and "FUBAR," the men decided to shift gears and name a project manager, a responsibility Herschel volunteered to take on. He then chose "Kings Of The Universe," or KOTU, as the team name.
During the decision making process, Scott expressed early concern in Andrew's ability to function on the team and questioned his work ethic after he spent much of the meeting complaining that Trump had not supplied them with bagels to eat.
"I never wanna underestimate anyone, I think that's foolish, but Andrew Dice Clay, he's not here to work," Scott said. "He's not focused at all."
The two teams then met Trump -- who was flanked by his children Donald Jr. and Ivanka -- and revealed their team names and choices for project manager. The Donald then explained the teams' first task: making cupcakes and selling them on the streets of New York City in a converted ice cream truck that each team would be able to decorate as the saw fit.
After The Donald addressed what he saw as a disharmony among KOTU, Andrew chimed in and repeated his complaint that he would have liked to have had bagels at their earlier meeting and didn't hold back in assigning blame for the bagels absence.
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"It's your fault because they're your people," Andrew said to Donald before a very awkward silence between the two ensued. Trump then said that Ivanka would be monitoring KOTU while Don Jr. would be working with Athena and told each team to get to work on their tasks.
Upon meeting to decide on a location where to sell their cupcakes, Clint's suggestion that the team set up shop in Times Square was initially shot down by some members who felt the location was too predictable and worried they may run into Athena if they chose to sell their as well.
However, Herschel eventually decided to approve the Times Square idea after noting that should they have to go head-to-head, the men would have more recognizable celebrities than the female team.
Drawing on his extensive experience from Monster Garage, Jesse volunteered to handle making up a design for the team's truck that would feature pictures of all the team's members and bright colors to attract attention.
Meanwhile, Joan, a native-New Yorker, made the first location suggestion for Athena, saying that they should sell their cupcakes by the Macy's near Penn Station because of the high concentration of crowds there.
However, Annie disagreed, saying that Trump had been critical of the first-season The Celebrity Apprentice team who sold hot dogs in Penn Station because the crowd, while plentiful, was largely penniless. The team eventually settled on selling on 57th and seventh -- the location of Playboy's New York office-- after Brande said that she could make a few calls to Hugh Hefner and get Playboy involved.
While Jesse and Brian went off to design the truck, the rest of KOTU met with chefs to begin concocting their cupcakes. After deciding on making both yellow and chocolate cupcakes, the team got underway with their baking. However, Andrew quickly tired of working in the kitchen.
"I'm not a baker, it's not the kind of guy I am," he said. "I didn't wanna put the hat on, I didn't wanna look stupid. I'm from Brooklyn, I can't have my friends in Brooklyn looking at me in this stupid hat... It's like a rule, don't look like a jerk-off."
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While angered by his ineffectiveness in the kitchen, Herschel seemed to make the best of a bad situation and allowed Andrew -- who also ended up taking Dennis with him -- to leave.
"In the kitchen everybody was working except Dice," he said later. "He didn't do crap. That's Dice, so you know how he works, that's his thing."
Tom added that Andrew was apparently unaware that, in the event that KOTU lost the challenge, he had put himself up as a scapegoat for the team's failure by not working in the kitchen.
Over at Athena's kitchen, everything ran smoothly until it was discovered that most of the chocolate cupcakes that Natalie had mixed had not risen and instead sunk in while they had baked. After initially panicking and considering making an entirely new batch at the last minute, the team decided that because the cupcakes still tasted good and that they would add chocolate ganache into the sunken cupcakes and use them anyway.
During the baking, Annie -- who seemed to put herself in charge of the baking team given the of absence of Joan, who was working on the truck's design with the other half of Athena's team -- also clashed with several of teammates who resented of her bossy approach.
KOTU also experienced cooking problems with their chocolate cupcakes after it was discovered that no one had put sugar into the mix -- resulting in "really bad" tasting cupcakes, according to the chefs who were working with the team.
"As project manager Herschel was overseeing all production issues, and he just dropped the ball," Clint said of the error.
Instead of cooking a new batch, the KOTU decided to coat the non-sugared cupcakes with a syrup and hope that the sweetness would sink in and fix the problem.
The following day, both teams arrived at their locations and set-up shop. KOTU arrived in Times Square and set their price-per-cupcake at $20 while Athena had more general prices and accepted any donations possible.
"They come flying out of ATM machines," Scott said. "People have $20 bills. $20 is the perfect price point."
KOTU also benefited from some celebrity appearances, as Tom had skateboarding legend Tony Hawk stop by and donate $1,000 while also getting the Naked Cowboy to sing on top of their truck.
Meanwhile, Athena benefited from Brande's Playboy connections as all of their workers came downstairs to buy cupcakes -- including a Playmate who was dressed in the traditional bunny costume and presented them with a $5,000 donation from Hefner.
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"I've got to give tremendous credit to Annie... I thought it was wonderful," Joan said of the donations Annie was able to bring in.
Meanwhile, KOTU's most notable stars failed to deliver the same punch for their team, as Herschel became angry that Dennis was not out selling cupcakes but rather sitting in the truck and waiting for people to come to him and claiming that he didn't "want to interfere with selling cupcakes."
Upon checking on KOTU, Ivanka noticed that Dennis was not pulling the weight for his team as well.
"I think the men are doing quite well. I think Herschel has quite a bit of spirit, which is good," she said, before adding that Dennis seemed "a bit lackadaisical to say the least."
Near the end of the challenge, Trump phoned both Herschel and Joan to tell them to send one of their cupcakes to a local bakery for a taste test. He added that the team with the better cupcake would be given an extra $15,000 to their final sales total. While Andrew chose a basic yellow cupcake to bring to the test, Melissa grabbed one of the chocolate ones that had not risen.
When she returned from the bakery, Melissa drew the ire of Annie, who was frustrated that Melissa had selected one of the defective cupcakes rather than one of the chocolate chip cupcakes their baking chefs had deemed to be the best. Melissa responded by reminding Annie -- who had seemed to continue to clash with several of the women during the sales period -- that given she'd been part of the truck design team, she hadn't been at the bakery and been privy to the chefs' feedback.
Just prior to the end of the challenge, Tom was able to secure one last $10,000 donation from Donnie Deutsch for KOTU, while Brande used her conenctions to score a $9,000 donation for -- much to Annie's frustration -- an entire tray of cupcakes.
That night, the two teams gathered in the boardroom with The Donald, Don Jr. and Ivanka. Joan called Athena's work during the challenge "extraordinary" and said that everyone had worked well together. The only complaint regarding Athena came from some team members who felt that Annie had usurped Joan's role as project manager, a claim that Annie dismissed by saying Joan had given her the responsibility to act the way she did.
Herschel initially said that KOTU had performed "great," but was interrupted by Andrew who preemptively defended his decision to leave the kitchen. Herschel later admitted that he had not like Dennis' contributions in the challenge either and told Trump that he "wouldn't get out of the van to work."
Before revealing the money totals for each team, Trump said that Athena had "easily" won the taste test and added that KOTU's cupcake had been called "disgusting" by the baker. To add insult to injury, it was then revealed that while KOTU had earned a respectable $49,449 that Athena had won the challenge by raising $61,257 before adding in the extra $15,000.
After dismissing Athena to go back to their room where they could watch him "grill" KOTU, Trump began talking to the men about why they failed the challenge.
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"Well who said that I couldn't get on the radio and have people down?" Herschel responded.
"Because you couldn't, you're not funny enough," Andrew shot back.
Dennis defended his actions as well, saying that he had not wanted to be a distraction but had been more than willing to see fans after they had bought cupcakes. However, Herschel didn't buy Dennis' excuse.
"He was only effective when he wanted to [be], and that's the problem," he told Trump. "You can't play half the game."
Dice made one last chance to defend his actions in the kitchen, but instead seemingly dug his own grave when he surprised Trump with comments that implied he wanted to quit the competition.
"I was miserable in there, I didn't like making cupcakes. So if anything I'm willing to leave for a few reasons. I personally think we all did a great job," he said. "I think what I did was great too, but I don't wanna be in a place where people think I'm not doing what I'm supposed to do, even though I know I am."
Since he had been the project manager for the losing team, Trump then asked Herschel to pick two contestants to face the final boardroom with.
After Herschel selected Andrew and Dennis, Trump dismissed the team and he and his children discussed who should be fired.
"I think it's a difficult decision," Ivanka said. "I think Herschel's the leader, but he wasn't able to rally his troops. That being said I don't think either Dennis or Dice rose to the occasion."
The arguing continued once Trump called Herschel, Andrew and Dennis back into the boardroom, with Dennis telling Trump that felt that Herschel had not developed a good enough game plan, The Donald eventually made his decision.
"In Dennis I've seen a tremendous [amount of fight] tonight. He's a very competitive guy. Herschel, he's really fought to stay," Trump told Andrew before firing him. "And you wanted to quit."
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(Photo credit NBC/Ali Goldstein) About The Author: John Bracchitta
