Watching last night's episode I got to wondering how much of The Apprentice is pre-arranged and not quite as spontaneous as it seems?

A couple of examples:

1. The initial phone call from Lord Sugar's office; the cameras are always present to film it and there's always someone dressed to take the call. There's never any discussion about what they should wear but they all seem to end up wearing appropriate attire.
2. Last night the retro lot happened to find an 80's nightclub who's front door was open, which happened to have dancers rehearsing and who happened to be available at short notice to appear in their video? Pre-arranged surely...?

There's probably lots of other examples. I know it is television and sometimes things aren't as they seem but The Apprentice does seem to push the 'spontaneous' boundary sometimes.

I think ALL of it is pre-arranged, even to the point of who Sugar fires.

They must shoot a lot of footage and it gets edited down to one hour of screentime so a lot of stuff we don't get to see. Scenes on the telephone, arranging stuff, waiting for people to ring back, that is removed.

There's no doubt in my mind that last year's winner, Tom, was picked before the show began. In terms of performance, Tom was the worst winner:


It's highly likely Sugar has got his favourite or favourites but the one positive element about this year is no candidate is described as an inventor. Whatever you think of Tom, he did have an advantage by calling himself an 'inventor'. Sugar was influenced by that. That shouldn't happen this year. Hopefully the winner will be someone with the best track record on the show and with a decent business plan.

The tasks are there purely for entertainment value (as individual contributions can be great on a losing team or non-existent on a winning team), so the eventual wins/losses record is irrelevant.

The structure of the show means that, even if he knows his finalists early on, Shugs will never be in the position of having to fire either of them.

Personally I think that there a few appointments set up for the teams by the production staff, who then guide Shugs in the right direction for his boardroom questions.

A big chunk of what is shown is sufficiently 'real' though - is as much as it's the genuine actions of the candidates in those situations..

There have been plenty of scenes of people answering the phone in their pyjamas/their pants/a towel over the years.

This was all filmed last year but when we see the episodes of tasks and firings these are films that are already in the can aren't they?
So when is show that is shown on BBC2, after the main show, filmed in reality.
I somewhow can't understand TV filming and schedules, to be honest.

Usually a couple of days before broadcast.

The first point has been discussed on here a number of times - the morning camerawork I believe is done in the morning but they get a lot more time than suggested on the final edit.

The second point I also wondered - not in terms of it being set up, because I know that it is and has to be, but I wonder how long production crew got to find a location, or whether an 80s theme was somehow an option for them, rather than an idea?

remember on the gadget task the other week, the person who got fired let slip that they were 'too late to pick kitchen' implying they were given two options, bathroom and kitchen, only one team could have each, and it was first come first served.


they usually announce this anyway (set up by lord sugar or whatever the v/o says). I assume that most appointments are set up and the street selling ones are a bit more spontaneous.

Two extremely good points. I wonder if they have a list of 'oppertunities' they can take. :
1) 80s dancers in 80s dance room
2) High combact boxers in boxing ring
3) Street Dance team in studio
etc....

Yeah I noticed the line about them being two late to pick kitchen - an element that wasnt given to the viewer but was very interesting.

A friend of mine was one of the models used in last years 'Nightclub' scene for one of the tasks...at least I think it was last year could even have been the year before! Anyway she was told by her agency to be on standby that week as they would likely be needing a model of her 'type' for a couple of days filming. So guessing more than we'd think is prearranged and they are given situations they are able to use rather than them thinking of them and then someone finding the locations last minute.

You make a good point too That may well be the case, it would definitely 'inspire' certain ideas. I wonder how much description they get with the locations, if they are given a list? Or maybe production crew just had to have a variety of scenarios on hand that would cover a few types of exercise (were the people in the boxing ring actually doing mixed martial arts or were they boxers?).


maybe it was the one where the finalists created a drink? one of them was the traingular penis bottle, the other was "bourban" (even though most people I know don't even pronounce it that way).

Indeed. And the phone app challenge last time resulted in two apps which played funny noises - they must have been told it needed to be that kind of app rather than for example the next Angry Birds.

On the other hand, if the teams are given some alternatives (e.g. you must choose bathroom or kitchen, or you must work with an 80s dance team or some street dancers) they still have to be inventive within those criteria, so I still feel it's a valid challenge. What I would like to see is a bit more transparency (so instead of "design a NOO phone app" it would be "design a NOO phone app that somehow plays noises to the user").

I also wish the voiceover would state "while the obvious answer would be to use the internet on their smartphones, the candidates are forbidden from doing so" otherwise when people have questions like "what's a cloche?" we are shouting "just f... google it!" at the TV screen!

There was a giant list of potential apps brainstormed for the apps task that didn't necessarily include being a noisy pain in the arse (ie Tom's Traffic Lights/Historical Temperatures apps or Susan's "I'm you and you're me" or Gavin's "Word Of The Day" app).

"Urbon".

People laughed at Tom's traffic lights, but you can buy a pint of beer for your phone.

The "i'm you and you're me" app


that's the one. but i say it borban not burban, like the biscuit!

I'd say a lot.

I'd go as far as to say that I think Alan Sugar even knows who he wants to go into partnership with before the TV competition has even begun.

I think he already knew who he wanted on their first interviews and before the cameras had even started rolling.

This would go some way in explaining to me why some of the contestants who in my opinion were some of the better ones got fired in the previous weeks.
It was in my opinion their business plan which got them fired, not necessarily the task itself.

Logistical common sense dictates that in order to get most of these tasks (and the filming!) done in 2 days, the teams will need to be "steered" down some relatively defined paths... I wouldn't even be too surprised if the briefing book they get would be something like a multiple choice test, where they're given some options for directions to follow, for which the producers have prepared (for instance) appropriate experts, locations and focus groups.

It's probably always been this way, it's just that after so many series, the strings are beginning to show...

Yes I think that's it. I suppose it's not entirely manipulated - for example in this task maybe they could pick any type of dance/work out, but picking from the list meant you got to speak to experts in the field rather than dancers taking a guess at what you might want to include.

It will have been always like this.

If you think about the actual logistics of most of the tasks it becomes obvious that the contestants themselves couldn't possibly have set them up.

They get instant access to TV studios, food making factories, experts, designers,...just so much to even list fully, things that the contestants simply wouldn't have access to realistically.
If you think about it how likely would it be for any of the contestants to even know how about going about some of these tasks let alone have the kind of permissions they would entail?

Furthermore, how likely would it be that the contestants could set these tasks up to look exactly like the same format of tasks in previous years and matching the exact same formula that these tasks have adopted over the years?

When you consider it all and try to look at the production aspects deeper than how we see them on the television broadcast, anyone would probably be likely to draw the conclusion that the contestants can't do a lot other than make decisions based on what has been set up in front of them.

Suddenly they all go off to a condiment or jam factory and become instant experts and get to work?
How does that happen? How would any of us just go and do that? If you think about what must be involved I can't see how the contestants can just go and do that off the bat.

There's so much infrastructure to consider that I think all these contestants can do is turn up to attend a pre-prepared setup and have it explained to them what they have to do and how they should go about doing it.
It's going to be all done for them as far as the setting up goes and what's left for them is as you yourself suggested choose from a pre-set list of decisions to take.
Like there's a multiple list set of options that they are allowed to select from.

Exactly, the experts for specific tasks just happen to be around.

Even within a certain field, somehow an expert within a particular niche area of that field just pops up out of nowhere and is at hand to help them.

So even when it appears to us that the contestants are making a decision about what product to create, when you look further down the timeline of that particular programme you realise that an expert in making that very narrow niche area of a product just happens to be there at hand.

So lets say for an example a contestant has to make a 'decision' on what kind of drink they want to create for a task. The contestant appears to 'come up with the idea' of organic tea. Lo and behold, what a stroke of luck, an organic tea expert will just happen to be around later on in the show.

Hey 'blowup', I only just read your post where you mentioned the kitchen/bedroom example.
I think your example provides me with some affirmation for my own view of how I feel it works.

I agree with you guys and it's be come more and more obvious as the series mount up... I guess the easiest way to describe would be like those children books or early text computer games where you are put in various situations and have a multiple choice as to what tO do next and the choice you make will ultimately decide your fate.. However in the series I would like LAS to mention that and say for example; team sterling you had a choice of 80's pop or Battle beat why did you make the choice of 80's pop instead of trying to make us think they come up with the whole Idea themselves.. If you get what I mean

Another thing that would be fun is if they have one choice which is so obviously wrong or will make them lose the task disastrously thus whoever made that choice would get blasted in the board room and we can have a good giggle at their expense

Sid's not actually looking for whoever makes the best app, pizza or chutney he's looking at how they interact, cope under pressure, sell to major corporations and generally handle themselves. The production task could be make a garden gnome for all the relevance the end product has.

They have to have advance knowledge and access to designers etc otherwise each task would take months