The Apprentice series 4 - Episode 4 - Photoshoot and the plotted demise of Simon Smith

After three weeks of same-sex groups, Alan Sugar decided to divide up the original teams. Team Renaissance now consists of Jenny, Sara, Claire, Simon, Alex and Michael, while Team Alpha is made up of Raef, Lee, Kevin, Helene, Lucinda and Jennifer.

After being brought back into the boardroom last week, Simon requested to be project manager for Renaissance, while Helene volunteered to lead Alpha.

This week's task was to organise their own photographic portrait business at Europe's largest retail centre, Bluewater. Alpha went for the lookalike photograph opportunity with a David Beckham lookalike. Renaissance for the beauty and glamour look, which comprised of satinized fabrics and reclining poses.

Whilst Helene set about auditioning would be “lookalikes” for her team’s focus, Simon’s first task was to deal with the tricky machinations of other team members, Alex Machiavellian Wotherspoon and Claire Houdini Young especially!

Alpha headed by Helene overspent but were able to sell expensive sheets of A4 paper with a print of the buyer with the look-alike. Mugs were printed upside down and to some extent it was indicative of Helene’s topsy-turvy management style, giving the least technically capable, Lucinda, the most technically demanding job. In a recent interview Margaret Mountford admitted that Helene gets better, well after the disastrous management for this task she certainly needs to! Their win was down to the public being prepared to pay out £15.99 for said paper prints.

Simon stepped up to take command of his newly formed team Renaissance,and gained a poisoned chalice which was regularly topped up by his ambitious self-seeking team mates. He failed to make money and the confusion over orders actually saw Renaissance lose money in this task and the end result was swift.

Alex turned down the opportunity to be Simon’s lieutenant and instead Claire aka the Rottweiler, as her family knows her, stepped up to the long walk between photographer and processing area. Yet again what should have been a simple task of sorting orders was badly managed by poor communication and dire organisation.

By the end of the show it was over all too soon because Mister nice guy was fired this evening, with regret, by the man who called Simon Smith his friend. Claire was given a red card and sent to her room, and Alex escaped but has clearly been clocked by eagle-eyed Margaret.

This episode showed several people as very game orientated, and others as possibly naive and nice but easy prey. Simon and Lucinda definitely fell into the latter category. Helene, Alex, Jenny and Claire into the former.

The most likely winners are probably still those invisible. I’m waiting to see how Lee fares. He’s the one with very little airtime, in case anyone was wondering! And has anyone seen, in her own admission, the world’s best salesperson? Jennifer appears to have evaporated too!

Expect fireworks next week when Katie Hopkins is a panellist on You’re Fired!

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