The deathwatch into tomorrow from last episode's four-person firing is mostly memorable because of Adam's stunned, extreme glee at having stayed up "until midnight!" morning, Kelly Perdew shows up for no reason whatsoever and then the "decimated" Excel gets Randal back, making him PM in a desperate bid for existence. He and his new happy, destined-for-success group (Brian, Marshawn and Rebecca) create a stunningly uninteresting but very informative and well-crafted seminar on "Making Your Mark," and Rebecca and Brian continue to be Kristi-esque about everything, worrying quietly about their chances at success. As the winning team, their reward is to go shopping for Michael Kors clothes, and Rebecca tries on hideous space pants.
Capital Edge, on the other hand, now consists of Alla, Felisha, Clay, Adam, and Markus. Yeah. Adam is PM, and immediately gets stuck between the "Sex Sells" team of Clay, Felisha, and Alla on one hand, and the "I Am Crazy" team of Markus on the other. When he's not blushing and feeling funny about the ways his body is changing as he grows up, he's taking Markus out into the hall for hushed and pointless conferences about how Markus is pointless and cannot speak or do anything useful. "Sex Sells" takes over -- Alla controlling Felisha and Adam masterfully -- and creates a somewhat vague "Sex At Work" seminar which is either about: the trouble sex can create, ways to respond to sex happening near you, or maybe how to do it. Whatever they're talking about, Adam is utterly uncomfortable, and Markus is talking about something, anything, everything else.
The presentations themselves are similarly one-sided: Excel is boring to talk about because Marshawn (the public speaking consultant) speaks publicly quite well, Randal (the most likeable person in the northern hemisphere) is quite likeable, Rebecca is fierce and intense, and Brian is great and tiny. They do a fantastic job, because they are the wheat of Team Excel and Trump has already sent the chaff flying. Capital Edge, on the other hand, isâ¦well, this is where things get both awesome and incredibly horrific.
Clay tells totally professional and wicked appropriate stories to a hundred strangers about co-workers he's wanted to fuck, asses he's admired, and how he likes to be spanked, and then misspeaks to the tune of calling Adam a "tight Jewish boy." The ten minutes of stunned silence that follow provide a unique environment in which to ponder this, the first of several whacked-out, crazy scenes tonight. Adam does not take it well, additionally mishearing it to the tune of being called a "tight-ass Jew." Which is a little different, and explains much of what follows, but in terms of the task was just the off-putting icing on a big old man-kiss of a gay wedding cake. During the presentation, Markus plays with a yo-yo, because he knows naught of either "Sex" or "Work."
After Capital Edge loses by a large margin, Alla pulls the puppet strings on first Clay's perceived anti-Semitism, then his terrifying gay sexuality, where he is a gay and has gay sex with other gay men. Unable to think quickly enough to deal with any of this, Clay is sure he's a goner until the final Boardroom with Adam and Markus, onto whom Carolyn finally is. She points out how he's lazy and does nothing but whine, which provides him the perfect opportunity to say "I told you so" at the end of the task -- not that he really got the chance, because Markus's team hardly ever lost, in spite of him -- and that she basically hates him. Carolyn and George get down on their knees and beg Markus to make sense when he talks (Trump: "You talk in riddles!"), but he cannot, and finally Trump fires him just to shut him the hell up. Which he cannot do, and continues babbling crazily long after the taxi has already disappeared from our view.
You'd think that Markus getting fired would be the best part. It isn't. The best part is in the Boardroom leading up to Markus's firing, where Donald Trump has some kind of neurological event and goes completely apeshit. And I mean to say that you have never seen this kind of behavior in your life. He first abruptly asks Clay if he's gay, acts stunned that Clay is gay, ascertains that Clay is therefore not attracted to women, clarifies that this Venn diagram excludes even women such as Alla, and then explains to us that this is why restaurants have menus: while Trump likes steak, other people like spaghetti.
Later, without even stopping to breathe almost, he: asks Adam straight up if he's a virgin (he is, but won't admit it), counsels him not to be afraid of sex because it is "not a big deal," posits that Adam will ten years from now be more "comfortable with sex," shares that sex has gotten him into "a lot of trouble" and cost him "a lot of money," discusses at length whether Adam is "soft" or "hard," and wraps up by telling Adam that there's "nothing like" sex, and that he should look forward to having it one day, in the creepiest, ickiest, most pervuncular way imaginable. Best episode of any show this side of Trading Spouses ever, hands down. But where I can see them.
An awesome montage of classic timepieces reminds us of the Corporate Weasel Death Watch that's been going on since last week. The three members of Excel who actually did something of value last week -- Marshawn, Rebecca, and Brian -- hang out and discuss how many of their team will be returning. Marshawn sees it, as she sees everything, as an opportunity to fine-tune her strategy. Rebecca and Brian agree on their intuition that at least two people will be returning to the suite, but she shushes him once he starts to speculate on whom he thinks this will be -- the walls have toadlike, virgin, stripper, or gay ears. Oh, man. Excel is the saddest bunch ever. Rebecca keeps giving Brian these very sexy, very hilarious super-spy looks through her bangs as she's shushing, like she's Carmen Sandiego and he's about to blab where the Seavers hid the microfilm.
Time passes. A flower opens into full bloom, thrives with the miracle of photosynthesis, and slowly withers and dies. The whole group of survivors is sitting around the gorgeous kitchen table, wearing their casual Death Watch outfits -- Randal is wearing sleeveless workout gear. Fade to everybody turning as one to stare at the door. Felisha pretends to bite her nails like she's typewritering a giant ear of corn, or chowing down a redwood. She's kind of adorable, you guys. I've been enjoying her little faces all along, but she goes all out with the cartoonery this week. I bet she's a lot more fun when there's no Alpha Blonde. Fade again, this time to Clay tidying up alone. Fade to the door, doing nothing. The sun circles, circles over glaciers moving majestically across the world and icecaps slowly melting into the sea. Last week, imagining this whole scenario playing out was fairly hilarious, but I forgot how boring it would be to actually be there. Which we...are.
Pangaea splits apart and forms continents, which eventually blossom with life. Time passes: In the living room, Alla notifies everyone that at midnight, she's "declaring them done." Adam, looking tired, eats some ice cream, and it's pretty cute because it's way past bedtime plus he gets to eat ice cream. Time passes: Brian is falling asleep sitting up, and the remains of the Bloven are cuddling. Alla finally breaks the silence. "There's no way they'd come back at midnight. Holy shit!" Brian looks lost and really quite attractive staring into space, telling us first that it's been "seven hours" and that Josh and the guys are his "brothers," then again at eight hours that "you might as well give up." Everybody goes to bed. The Grand Canyon happens not all at once, but slowly, over time, as a river wears its way into the world. Even Michael Rapaport stands upright, roaming, developing tools, hunting and gathering, becoming agrarian, inventing sexism, becoming agricultural, inventing the Roomba. Becky Conner goes like this: Lecy Goranson, Lecy Goranson, Sarah Chalke, Lecy Goranson.
I know for a fact that I don't know who this Kelly man is, but I have even less of an idea about it now that I've seen a few minutes of footage of him. Dude. He looks like...some guy. Some guy that just woke up. Trump menaces about how "Kelly's been learning a lot and having a lot of fun," and sleepy little Kelly agrees that he's been "learning a lot," and Trump has to pretty much threaten Kelly to agree to part two of the claim, calling him a "wiseguy." Then there is a stupid segue to this week's task. Again.
See, Kelly's been "learning" while "working," so it's "a teaching thing," so it's "about education," so their task involves the leisure learning center The Learning Annex. My brain hurts. Marshawn seems intrigued but unimpressed, which is her theme song. Trump explains that the Learning Annex is an "amazing continuing education program" which teaches 8,000 classes a year. Alla will not be fired, thanks to her exemption last week. The task: to create a new class and teach it in front of an audience. Adam and Markus both look dorky and spaced out. They will be evaluated by the students on how educational and how entertaining their seminars are, and the team with the highest average score will win.
Open on a scary, stupid picture of Donald Trump, standing with his dorky old man-fist in the air behind a Learning Annex podium. Learning Annex LOVES Trump, because he makes them a SHITLOAD of money saying basically nothing, every time he speaks for them. Which is kind of the point of the Learning Annex: Oops, I didn't make a billion dollars after taking a three-hour course! I have a three-ring binder, but no money! How did this happen? Can you tell me? Here's more of my money! Miss Cleo, where is my money? The poverty line rests on a pile of three-ring binders and lottery scratch-offs.
Adam appoints Alla Queen of Brainstorming, which pleases her, although she doesn't have a special crazy outfit for this responsibility. Adam talks about how he wants to keep a collaborative environment going, which is nice except for the Markus factor, and says that Alla did a great job. We see her ask for five ideas in ten minutes, and then -- is she psychic? -- goes, "Okay, Markus?" He replies, "I hear ya." She gets out her pen: "Let's start writing." But Markus is not done with this conversation, which has clearly just ended, and whose end he has just acknowledged. "Well, I'm going to do it differently. I just wanna pitch you guys on what my thoughts are, okay…" Everybody puts down their pens, because they know what's coming, and then watch each other go slowly from bored, to frustrated, to angry, to spiritually destroyed.
Essay Time! Write yourself a nice, long, thick damn essay about any of the following subjects:
Contributions to your team
A list of more than one thing
Age-appropriate stylistic choices
Shutting the hell up
Stuff other people might possibly know about
Great. Now fold it up, shove it in a #10 envelope with a SASE, and address it to:
The Apprentice
P.O. Box 122
Your Ass, NY
And I want you to mail that bastard as hard as you can.
Here's an example: "None of us have enough time it's easy to say gee time is what it is and and let's not think about it but it's really is it is what meaning you give it and then start talking about how how that how those two things can can can end up in results. I'm done." Thanks, Markus. Alla's like, "That's great, that's one topic -- kind of -- and even though I neither asked you to say it aloud, nor did I ask you to interrupt what we call quiet brainstorming time, and in fact implied that you should spend ten minutes out of your entire life thinking with your mouth closed, why don't you hit us with four more? Since you're already rudely commandeering and wasting our time, and all."
Markus is incensed! "That's not the way I think!" He is scandalized that the entire group has come to a consensus about something ridiculously simple that happens every day without consulting him! And by "without consulting him," of course, I mean, "with his assent"! Clay levels with Alla: "You can't force him to do that. He can't do it." Alla -- doing that whole "prove to me you're not an asshole" vibe, is like, "He can't? He can't give four more ideas?" Markus leans back in relief that she's finally getting just how horrific her request is: "I come up with blockbuster ideas." He crosses his arms, like how she's a total idiot for not knowing that that's his sole purpose -- didn't she hear about "Smooth As Silk?" Or the time he ordered that blockbusting cashew chicken? -- and Alla counters that nobody has any idea of what he's talking about. Ever.
What response can Markus have, besides explaining a few things to Alla? Who can blame him for taking an incredibly condescending tone with his "You know something, Alla?" Or, indeed, for pronouncing it like "You Can Call Me Al"-la? Who can blame him -- now that Adam has whisked him out of the room before somebody starts swinging at his horrible ass -- for immediately interrupting his Project Manager to demand that Adam "listen to him," even though that's all anyone has been doing since Markus's days in Jams and the hat with the flaps on the back. He is so totally snooteriffic about "Listen to me, Adam, if you don't listen to me I can't tell you anything," which: zero sum, because if you do listen to him, same deal, and then he starts in with this "Let me tell you about my concept, okay," which is a brilliant way of demonstrating that he still doesn't get it. Any of it. Categorically. Adam loses no cool whatsoever, which is awesome, because he quickly gets Markus off that track: "You're brilliant [maybe] and creative [maybe] and I need you focused on the task [never gonna happen]." Markus is aghast: "But I completely am!" And he is. Completely focused on the task, I mean. It's just not the task Adam's talking about.
Adam tells us privately that Markus is way more enjoyable when you're not PM, because you can just sit back and watch him pants around all day. That's not such a terrible thing to say, although all in all, I prefer Josh's equal-opportunity frustration with Markus's ability to ruin everything, because it implies some kind of investment in the task. "When I'm Project Manager, unless you're adding value, we need to move on." But when I'm not Project Manager, hand me a mic.
The brainstorming continues, among the brains that aren't in a low-pressure asshole system. Alla's all about things like "Business After Hours" and "How To Socialize With Your Co-Workers." This last is underscored by a shot of Markus, sitting as far away from everyone else as possible, and Adam, looking dorky and at a loss. Felisha offers "Business Etiquette," and Alla likes it. Clay wants a catchy title, and Alla offers "Sex In The Office." The Bloven, including Honorary (But Temporary) Member Clay, go wild. Adam pees himself a little. "I don't feel comfortable, as PM, having the word 'sex' [involved], personally."
Seeing a crack in the armor, the Bloven run through a big list of other words, each of them a tiny feather-light "I'm not touching you" poke in the ear of Adam's deep insecurity. None of which are necessary, none of which are useful as anything other than a PM taunt: Fornication, Intimacy, Copulation, Intercourse, Attractions, Breeding, Making Love, and Affection. Clay and Felisha giggle madly, like gross little girls, and Clay in particular is excited by "Intimacy." Adam splits a hair about how he doesn't want the word "intimacy" to allude to sex, which is shorthand for "No." Clay interviews that Adam didn't want to talk about sex because he's never had it, and has probably not said the word more than ten times in his life. Both of which are horribly, obviously true, and both of which are completely beside the point. Clay's a cool kid and a Blitch, for the moment, so it's fine. I'm not sure about defining your coolness factor against the control group of a social misfit, but on the other hand, I do it every week for your entertainment.
In any case, Clay votes for Sex At Work because "sex is catchy" (or it can be, if you're not smart about it) and Alla's happy because "we can all speak eloquently about it," which is a HUGE lie and she's gotta know it, and Felisha's down because of Alla, and then Alla smiles beautifully at Adam and he gives in, and that's...everybody that matters. Alla interviews about the awesome chance at winning: "People enjoy fun presentations," and the only possible problem would be Adam "blowing a gasket." Cut to Adam doing exactly that. Adam continues to freak out, and Clay brings up STDs, causing Adam to almost start crying. Even Alla's like, "Go easy on him." Then she laughs some more.
Meanwhile, Excel is doing nothing so interesting. Randal interviews that he wants another win as PM, and they brainstorm. Marshawn offers "negotiation" and "networking," and Randal is down, thinking about subjects like "Big City Networking" and "New York Networking." Brian yawns, although in this particular case, I'd be interested to hear them talk: Randal is crazy good at this stuff, as we'll see, and teaching it is Marshawn's actual job. Marshawn brings up "Pageantry and Beauty," which is how she paid for her education after all, and Rebecca moans something inarticulate and troubled. Brian makes a stink face as Randal mentions "Mother's Day Gifts," "Favorite Recipes," and "How To Research and Create A Family Tree." It's a pretty boring conversation all by itself, but especially after the whole Sex At Work thing.
Rebecca and Brian -- the new Kristi and, uh, Kristi -- are big old nay-sayers, wanting something "hot," and Brian starts yelling, "Bigger, bigger, bigger! Sexy! Let's sex this up!" How eerie! Brian interviews that Randal, as a (five times over) doctor, thinks "analytically," which was a total plus at the beginning of the episode, but is now an issue because Randal can't think "out of the box." Brian worries that everything might be shifting toward a "not over the top and creative idea."
Randal runs with the conversation to an area of "Standing Up" and "Making Your Mark." They immediately start brainstorming in earnest, excited about standing out in "a variety of contexts," and Rebecca complains that "teaching people how to feel good about themselves...that's like for the experts." Experts like Marshawn and Randal? And Marshawn? She interviews that Randal's choice of concept will rest on his shoulders -- like the wreath of laurels that will soon be resting on his crown -- and then we see Brian and Rebecca giggling dismissively and alone, like giant prats.
That night, Adam's working hard. The ideas that he likes best -- crushes on co-workers, chivalry, and gossip -- are the most nonsexual of the list, I'm assuming. Felisha's more interested in the gossipy "When it happens, you can handle it with class," while Clay loves the vague "ethics" of it all. Because apparently after "sex in the office," there is still a possible discussion of "ethics" apart from: don't. Alla's most interested in the aftermath of office affairs, and the gender split double-standard discussion it implies. I'm with Alla and Adam -- although given what's going to happen, I think he could stand to lobby a little less for the whole "crush on a co-worker" thing. And Markus? Here's Markus's research focus: "There's a lot of information, that is, what I'm seeing here is a common thread with everything is I can read this more in-depth and come up with a great deal more information." Sexy! And oh so topical!
Adam's like, "So -- just so we're clear -- at this point that's...all you have?" A reading on how much information there is in this world? Markus gets just amazingly pissy throughout this entire part, because he's Markus: "No, I'm not done -- I'm close to being done…" Adam wonderfully bottom-lines it for us: "When Markus is talking, it's like jamming a lot of random words together, and calling it a sentence. It has no meaning." Back on the couch, Markus's idea for a topic having to do with sex at work: "I love meeting people." Seeing this as a preamble to some more crazy, but not wanting to seem insensitive to Markus's craziness, Clay murmurs sweetly, "I know you do." Markus gets outrageously bitchy at this, for some reason, and starts blustering about how "let's just be serious" for a second because "we're all professionals." Now, I have no doubt that there are some editing hijinks going on here, because I'm positive we haven't seen a tenth of the dicking around of Markus that's been going on all night, but it does come off as rather surreal when he flips out. Adam's like, "Okay, so like...what's the point?" And this is what pushes Markus over the edge. He's incredibly angry now, like, more angry than we've seen him yet, and Alla just stares as Markus, having taken huge offense at such a bizarre request, hisses, "Adam, quit. Take the leash off me, just relax...I'M SPENDING MORE TIME WITH THIS [constant harassment to get to the point] AND I WOULD BE DONE [otherwise]." Total lie, Markus. Total lie.
Adam is somewhat taken aback, but still keeps his cool, and takes Markus aside again. Off behind a screen, Adam levels with Markus: "To be completely honest, you had the least research." Again. Also, you could substitute "research" here with almost any word other than "hot air" or "bullshit," and still come out on top. Markus is totally condescending and instructive, like Adam's crazy, awful uncle, as he explains the following totally related and constructive concept: "You know what though, my friend? What you're going to find out in the end? Okay, I think what you're going to discover by the time this task is over [is], I ain't going to be the fly in your ointment, I'm not going to be your problem. Everybody has their own style and I'm not going to be out of control and talking for an hour." Adam, shocked into submission by the total insult -- not just to him personally, but also against, like, logic -- implied in demeanor and content here, mumbles, "Okay?" And again, Markus is enraged by the interruption. "JUST HEAR ME OUT. LET ME TALK." He comes off insane. He comes off completely out of control. He's a fly in the ointment of God.
Adam interviews that Markus was given several different responsibilities, but "never executed any results." He thinks that if they lose, it will be Markus's butt on the line. You'd think that, wouldn't you? He's gone from being merely worthless to aggressively, violently worthless. If it were just that he were a dork and incapable of linear thought, that wouldn't be so bad, but he's just so damn...self-righteous about it. No matter how much abuse he has gotten, and I suppose most people would say he's entitled to feel badly about that, he still refuses to offer anything else, and gets really pissed when you point that out. Walking back to join the group, Markus fnur fnurs that he's "glad we had this chance to talk," which is awesome because it means Adam fooled him into thinking they actually had a conversation, which Adam is proving really good at doing. Not that he should have to, and certainly not that he should have to often.
Trump Wisdom for this week is: "Get To The Point." I'm still smarting from the whole "take the leash off" conversation, so I'm like, "I hear ya!" Trump tells us about how he doesn't like to waste time in meetings, he likes to be "quick," "short," and "to the point," and that he doesn't "play games." This seems innocuous, but since I've already seen the episode, this part makes me almost vomit. He yells at this client on speakerphone about the terms of the contract, and two execs watch from the chairs formerly occupied by Miss Universe and Fake Linda Tripp. This week it's two dudes, one of whom has a Rohypnol vibe and looks like he works at Pacey's brokerage, and the other looks like a misplaced person from Monty Python who is now a homeless drunk. It's boring as hell and contains no wisdom, but at least it's short, quick, and to the point.
Rebecca, on crutches, welcomes the guests, while her partner in bitching about this task, Brian, passes out workbooks. I love how obviously not their show it is. Marshawn tests the mics and then tells us in interview that she doesn't believe in luck but has her fingers crossed nonetheless. Like you need this "luck" thing when you're on a team with Randal and yourself, Marshawn. Or when your opponents include Useless Markus, Critical Clay, Pointless Felisha, and the Maiden Adam. George enters, and Randal is perfectly charming, telling them to let their light shine and amplify it. His smile makes tiny birds and angels fly out of the television and dress your Christmas tree for you. George interviews that Randal's totally great, even though the boring subject matter is "lacking." ["I think my man George has a non-sexual man crush on Randal." -- Sars] Randal starts with a PowerPoint presentation outlining the whole workshop, but interviews it for us prop-free. Section one is a questionnaire about your personal communication style, the second part is a lecture on "bold and assertive communication" -- we see Marshawn talking about "vocal dynamics" -- and the third part is breaking the class into "core groups" for activities and exercises. This is so awesome because it's what Marshawn does every day of her life, and it's incredibly relaxing to see somebody do something well on this show. Like, before this, I really enjoyed the very shiny ball that Josh spray-painted for Zathura, and that was about it as far as excellence. Oh, and the permission thing for Lamborghini. I liked that too, except for the embarrassing presentation.
So everybody in a focus group always looks the same, like Price Is Right contestants from a time machine, and that's what's going on here, because it's not an actual Learning Annex class, it's a stunt, and what you get for things like this is the unemployed, the crazy, and the deeply unappealing. They all talk about stuff they want, and it's mostly run-of-the-mill, and Randal explains to us how you "stand out when you're passionate," whether it's in "a reserved way," like Randal, or "sincere," like Adam, or "boisterous," like...all the boisterous people are gone. Clay's kind of boisterous, sometimes, but that's more in service of something else entirely. Point being, "everybody stood out in their own way" during the seminar, and then afterwards Randal walks the group through the follow-up, and us through the rest of the episode: "I'd rather speak confidently about something safe than risk the opportunity to look ignorant about something with zest or zip." Like...sex? Racial tensions? Asses, asses, asses?
To underscore this salient and almost prescient point, we cut to a weird montage of -- is it things that Trump thinks are sexy? That must be it, because all the women have no heads and it's all juvenile, little-boy, waist-level Freudian shit: somebody's legs and ass, somebody's taut tummy, some more ass, kissing, the Essex Street sign with the first two letters obscured. I had a roommate in college -- worst roommate ever -- and he kept a drawer full of nudist magazines from the '70s, and the point is not how I know that, but that the guy was a total Markus, and I remember when we saw the magazines I was enraged because -- this suffices as porn? Fat families with tiny genitalia sitting around on '70s furniture? Even your porn is sad? I'm not sure what made me think of that, and it was kind of a Josh thing to do at the time, and to bring up now, but God it still makes me mad. Sorry. Legs, tummies, asses, mommy, Sex Street.
Quick Quiz! Which would you rather hear about?
A) The lack of sexual adventures of any kind, as related quixotically by a tiny little virgin who used to have a bowl haircut and internet access? And by "used to" I mean, "last week"?
B) The violent and scary work-related sexual adventures of an ex-stripper who drives men so wild with desire that they go on freaky lesbian-mugging and family-killing rampages to buy you jewels and fine furs?
C) The adventures of Clay's ass, and the hands it has known?
E) One time when Markus was on The Casino throwing money around and mugging down with trannies?
F) Or possibly the lame-ass tantric sex acts Markus learned about in the wine country from a toothless French nag for the price of a glass of really excellent Chardonnay? And how he cried when she wouldn't hold him after?
G) None of the above.
Answer: B, kind of. If you're being honest.
Sadly, no. But also, wonderfully, NO, because it's a disaster of Bay of Pigs proportions. So the class is sitting around wondering what kind of pyramid scheme timeshare bullshit they've let themselves get suckered into, and then Adam stands up in the middle of them, clutching a microphone, and says in the creepiest possible fashion, "SEX AT WORK." Everybody laughs after their heart attacks die down, and he walks to the front of the room to join his teammates.
Carolyn comes in, and the audience cheers at the introductions, and then Adam is very cute about how they're going to talk about "Sex; relationships at work. Something that we're all used to." The people look around like they might get arrested for having seen this tiny boy child say the word "sex" multiple times. Half of the awkwardness of this is vibing off Adam like when your cell phone rings and the TV freaks out: it's psychic feedback you can feel on a visceral level, even through the magic of TiFaux. "But I have to be quite honest, I'm a nice Jewish boy from Atlanta, and I wasn't comfortable with this subject…" They laugh, because...I'm not entirely sure why this is hilarious, but I guess it is, and it's important to say: this gets a laugh. "We're not going to speak [down] to you, this will be an interactive experience. We're going to connect with you." Worried faces! Alla gets a huge laugh with her arch "…not that interactive!" and her timing is excellent. Adam again mentions that he's a "nice Jewish boy from Atlanta" who didn't even know that he was making that obvious double double entendre. See, but I don't think that "nice" or "Jewish" or "boy" or "Atlanta" really imply an ineptitude or naïveté about sex. If he'd said "home-schooled closet case" or "deeply repressed dork cut off from his own body," it might have been clearer. And nearer the point, frankly.
Clay forces everybody -- everybody in the Price Is Right, floral-printed, muu-muu wearing, toupeed, spider-veined, poorly-made-up audience of tourists -- to give a big "Howdy!" and raise their hands if they've ever had a crush on someone in the their office. This, my friends, is a recipe for comedy, but not necessarily for forging a connection with their audience, because the candidates are almost uniformly beautiful, and the last thing I want is to talk about my sexual aspirations with a TV-looking person. Especially with cameras literally everywhere. I can't even handle a hot x-ray technician. The most vociferous respondents are the ones without a chance in hell, and everyone looks kind of horrified. Carolyn does the Connecticut Slow Burn I love so much.
We get interview from Carolyn about how she doesn't even know what the hell they're talking about: is it a good idea to have sex in the workplace? A bad idea? "It's funny," she admits, "but it isn't educational." Alla takes the mic and is, of course, smooth as silk, all about how they're not going to be judging anyone, but just talking about how to address uncomfortable situations in the work environment. On the one hand, props for actually giving people something to hang onto, as far as a point to all this. But pans for not making that clear to anyone on your team. Carolyn's still going crazy with her the hell? faces, and fucking Markus takes out a yo-yo. Now, I would have stuck him front and center and given him free rein for five minutes, and gone to sleep happy with the fact that none of those people were ever going to have sex again because they'd all be in comas, but I can appreciate them sidelining him for the actual presentation, because God knows what that guy would come up with. No, because even God would be like, "Shut this dude UP."
Adam interviews that things were going well, "until Clay started with his comments." Now, I love you guys, and I know opinions on this run high, so all quotes from here to the end are verbatim, and all opinions expressed by yours truly are solely mine and nobody else's. Cut to Clay saying, "…Maybe I saw this amazing guy that came into work one day, and I was like, 'Oh my God, look at his ass.'" One woman blinks, one starts to chew her lip nervously, and I collapse. Clay, come on. Here's the thing on that: it's one thing to be judged and receive prejudicial treatment for being gay. It's a horrible thing. But what I cannot stand is this "I'm not touching you, I'm not touching you" approach to sexual equality: he's daring you to have a bias and freak out on him. And since he doesn't know anything about you, that's a guerrilla attack and has more to do with gearing up for future outrage than it does about the mistreatment itself. It's the "do I look fat in this?" approach to cultural change, and what it does is piss people off.
But that's not even the real problem here, it's mostly mine, because the real problem is: Gross me out, dude. Stop looking at my ass, you know? Picture this: Markus stands up and says the following: "…Maybe I saw this amazing woman that came into work one day, and I was like, 'Oh my God, look at her tits.'" Okay? So Clay continues, "There you are, and you wanna talk about it, but you can't." Can't just talk about her tits whenever you want? How is this a gay issue? How is The Man keeping you down by frowning on the ass talk? Carolyn gets distinctly unhappy, and Felisha and Adam are both getting more nervous, as Clay continues: "I had an employer once that liked to come up and slap me on the ass, and say, 'Hey, boy, you're doing a good job.'" Is that even on topic? Now it just sounds like...it's not sexual harassment, it's not an invitation to love, it's not anything but...Clay's inability to shut up, I guess. "Sex At Work" is a bit tangential to "Clay's Experience Of Sex Or Whatever At Work."
Clay: "I'm actually gay...I don't have a problem saying that…" Dude, we know. Adam starts having a big problem here, and there's not a chalkboard to sketch all the math out on that one, because he's actually having one hundred distinct and separate problems at this moment. Clay then ties it all together with, "If you are gay you have the same problems -- and sometimes you have even more because you don't get the respect…" Which, I agree with his point, but he's kind of screwed the pooch on that, because while I think that in the course of an everyday conversation this basic issue of sexuality can come up, and in ways that flaunt your sexuality no more than introducing yourself as "Mrs. Donald Trump" (stop flaunting your sexuality!) or referring to your boyfriend or girlfriend (stop flaunting your sexuality!) or discussing your future allowed-by-law wedding (stop flaunting your sexuality!), the buck stops at the point where you start feeling that your right to talk about the new recruit's hot ass is being impinged upon by an unfeeling and rigid right-wing society. Felisha interviews that Clay was "the king of awkward moments during this presentation." This interview clearly took place before the Boardrooms, or else he'd have been demoted to Prince or Viscount or Secretary of State of Awkward Moments, but it does lead into the most contentious moment in the series:
Adam: "Speaking about first dates…you know what's great about dinner is that you have great conversation, but I have to feel really comfortable with the person, and I also have to be willing to spend the money [unhealthy, uncomfortable giggle signifying he's never been on a date of any kind]."
Clay: "But remember, he's the shy, tight [slight pause because he knows there's something wrong with this sentence] Jewish boy."
Adam: [uncomfortable giggle; long, long silence] "Okay…"
Now, I think every single week I've mentioned Clay's inability to read a room, his tiny little skips in emotional logic that derail moments and make everything weird. He's socially awkward at least once, it seems, every episode. Never anything large, never anything heinous, just a little crack in the moment that snaps everyone out of the pleasant vibe of intercommunication. He chose the precisely wrong moment to question Randal during the milkshake task, he ruined the team-building moment with his Lamborghini comment during the Best Buy reward, et cetera. I think in social dynamics and I get pretty ugly about it -- it's why Markus ticks me off so bad -- and you've figured this out about me by now, and Clay sets off my awkward-dar at least once an episode. But come on, Clay. Work with me here. The "tight Jewish boy" comment is many things at once: hideously regrettable in this sexual context; regrettable coming on the heels of the "willing to spend the money" thing; stupid to try to riff on Adam in front of this audience of old people who probably think Adam's cute as a button; and regrettable as a joke, considering that Adam has already run it into the ground in the footage we've seen, and I'm sure he said it a few more times in what we didn't see, because it's code for his entire response to this task: I am deeply motherfucking uncomfortable with talking about sex, people. All of these are trouble, but they're not the main thing. The main thing is what Adam's wrong about, because he's right about it in the end:
"I cringed...basically Clay called me a tight-ass Jew. I'm not sure if, word for word, that was what he said, but [he said] Jew, and somewhere, tight-ass [was] in there, and implying that Jews are cheap." Now, Clay didn't actually say "tight-ass," although it would have been more to the point if he had, but not in a racist way: Adam is anal-retentive in a classic way that goes beyond racial lines. He's Portnoyishly weird about sex, true, but it's not because he's Jewish. Most importantly, though, you don't put tight and Jew in the same sentence, because you don't want those lines drawn. There are a thousand other non-Jewish examples I could give you, but I'm not going to, because I'm not Clay and I'm not a fool, and I know better, but this is what the show gives us to work with. The human brain -- such as Adam's very excellent brain, for example -- will connect the dots and go to the place that they're always on the lookout for. I don't know what it's like to be Jewish in Atlanta, and I'm okay with that, but I do know that the "bitch" and "insecure woman" and little girl stuff that happens with Clay pushes a lot of people's buttons, and the same thing applies here. Check yourself before you wreck yourself.
Adam wraps up well, albeit a little flustered: "I think we've really been able to captivate relationships at work, and we thank you so much for joining us." I don't know how you "captivate" relationships, but if I did I'd be set for life. Adam interviews that it was a "calculated risk" to make the class "a little bit less structured" -- and I think whatever structure there was, we didn't get to see, because it looked like a squeamish screaming mess of awkwardness and stepping on each others' lines -- and then makes the most important point: "Clay may have offended a good deal of individuals...it only takes four or five people to get seriously offended by a comment like that...and give us a poor score. He was a loose cannon." I appreciate Adam's delicacy here, because Clay said a lot more shit that worried me, and while I can appreciate Adam hyper-focusing on the perceived racist comment toward him during a wretchedly uncomfortable seminar, I doubt very much that he's completely forgotten the other stuff. So he proves the right point by being intent upon the wrong point: if Adam heard "tight-ass Jew" and all its miserly connotations, I'm sure that more than "four or five" people in the audience felt the same way, which means that he's right at the same time he's wrong -- and he's right for the right reasons, so I'm okay with it.
Afterwards, Clay approaches the team, asking, "Anybody hate me for anything I said?" And he's talking about the gay stuff, I guarantee you, because A) he's self-obsessed and B) he's from Texas. Texan anti-Semitism is an afterthought -- there are so many more people to hate first! -- because there aren't that many Jews in Bryan, Texas. Especially not compared to, say, New York City. I'm not denying the existence of anti-Semitism in Texas by any means, but it's decaf compared to what I've seen in other areas of the country. Ugly and horrible and stupid, yes, but low on the list of who's gonna get it first. And no, it's not cool to get into a "whose victimhood from prejudice wins" conversation, but I'm trying to explain Clay's mindset: not even on his radar.
Markus is like, "No!" very vigorously, which is funny because he's the only one to really feel the gay stuff was that damaging to them as a group. Adam says, rationally and helpfully, that the only thing that "really bothered" him was "the Jewish comments," and he asks that Clay refrain from that crap in the future. Clay's blown away by this, because he had no idea he'd crossed a line of any kind. Markus's finest moment is here, because he spends the entire conversation going, "Wait 'til later. Wait 'til later. Wait 'til later." Word, Markus. Man.
Adam and Clay continue to discuss it, and Adam goes into detail about the hows and whys, but does it ham-fistedly enough that I don't really think Clay grasps what he's saying: "Being a tight-ass and all that...I wasn't sure how I...honestly, I personally…" Which, if you aren't thinking in terms of Jews being tight with money, and why would you be, doesn't give a whole lot of background, and I can see it coming off to Clay like, "Please do not use the word 'Jew' at all for the rest of your life." Which is pretty much the face, and response, that Clay gives: "It wasn't meant to, so...if I need to apologize to you, I apologize," which I usually hate, but he looks so damn lost here I want to give him the benefit of the doubt. Just this once.
Clay interviews, "Multiple times throughout the presentation, Adam said 'I am the conservative Jewish boy...I grew up in a small Jewish family in Atlanta,' and all I did was play off that...you know what, I'll be sensitive to it, but at some point he needs to learn to relax." Which is either, you know, the worst thing anyone has ever said, or completely in line with the paragraph: he knows he fucked up, but he's not sure how, and he's still not getting the main point, which is that if somebody on your own team found it offensive, it's a sure bet people in the audience had the same reading, which is Adam's eventual point once he calms down. At least with Adam he can talk it out, but seminar-wise, that ship has sailed. The cards are filled out, and there's no way to get them back into the room for some kind of post-mortem explanation of his off-putting, unfunny, awkward and potentially insulting comments -- which is why you fucking muzzle it in a situation like that.
Into the Boardroom! Markus opens the door for Rebecca, and Carolyn is dressed as a flapper. She's wearing a boob-centric gold-detailed dress and looks like twenty million bucks, which is how much I said the sports industry is worth last week, even though clearly I meant twenty billion. Trump emerges from his usual creepy pit of darkness and is seated before he fakely notices Carolyn and gets all, "Whoa whoa! What have we here?" Carolyn smirks that he's "not the only one who dresses in tuxedoes to go out," which causes a tiny blip because that was weirdly worded, and she informs everyone that she has "a dinner at Trump National Golf Course" this evening. He tells her it's a beautiful dress and quickly jumps on Markus about how Adam did as PM.
"Um, at times good, at times he showed his inexperience." That's the shortest sentence Markus ever tried to say. Clay says that he was "impressed with Adam," and half-backhands that he "really grew a lot." I don't think this was an intentional swipe at Adam's age -- see "Clay's inability to say things the best possible way," above -- but it's funny. Marshawn and Brian, on the Excel side, say that Randal was a great PM, "as always." Carolyn looks very disapproving as she describes the Capital Edge project: "Capital Edge taught a class called Sex At Work." Consider Trump's attention gotten.
Carolyn explains that their class was about "intimacy in the workplace," and then does that thing I like, where the cameras jump to various people as she reads off the comment cards. "No agenda, no flow of ideas [Adam], poor presentation skills [Clay, obviously], and it was boring for a juicy topic [Alla, Adam]." On three criteria (educational merit, entertainment value, and presentation), their average score was 6.98. Carolyn kind of smiles, but Clay and Felisha are wary. George says that Excel took "a different tack," and did a presentation called "Stand Out! How To Make Your Mark." The comments: "Lots of fun, Randal was a good coach [Randal], reps were friendly and very well-informed [Marshawn and Brian], dynamic and informative, bravo [Rebecca]." The average score was 7.07, which is a pretty good margin considering how everybody always answers 1, 7 or 10 on those surveys (the "seven effect," for proof of which, look at the score for the shambolic Capital Edge class), which is why a lot of people push for five-point scales on subjective metrics like this in order to get better calibration. Adam is grossed out because this is the first time math has beaten him in his life.
Trump praises Randal about how he "hasn't lost yet, as PM," but not for the ameliorating factor that he's been PM exactly twice and is the only one to do so, and Adam continues looking disgusted/nauseated during the obvious vote for Randal's exemption week. The reward, continuing on the "Kelly is learning to build" vector that does not actually exist, is that they will now "enjoy [themselves] as students" learning to "dress for success" from Michael Kors. They are all pleased by the free clothes, so much so that they overlook the part where they'll have to be in his horrible farty presence. Alla looks like she will cut you, even after Trump reminds her of her exemption this week.
Nobody looks at anybody when they return to the suite, and Adam interviews that that was "the worst five minutes of this entire interview process," but he only thinks this because he didn't have to watch himself singing. Alla jumps around all buoyant and exempt about how "there's always the task" and "we just have to stay strong and do better." Adam flounders in interview about the horrible sensations he is having, and then Adam, Alla, and Rebecca have a very adorable and funny moment.
Alla is wigging hardcore about how much she loves Michael Kors and how she'll flip your wig and kill your dog for a chance to score some Kors, and like, you're a multi-millionaire, dude. Go getcha some. This is like on Big Brother where even the vegetarians eventually get like "I would eat a steak at this point" and praying to false peanut butter idols for vengeance, because it's more about the getting than the having. I like Alla a lot: "I don't get jealous! [But] I'm jealous! And I'll say it to everybody! I am jealous! And pissed off!" She's curling over the kitchen table like she just rolled sevens on a Benjamin and Adam says, cutely, off-camera: "I love it!" Alla goes on in interview about how victory now has meaning, because "I don't wanna lose another Michael Kors reward," and that's sad, because no matter how many tasks you win, Alla, you're fated to get bullshit rewards like hockey and baseball and that. And I think that's a huge part of her dismay here, because all of her rewards -- and she's one of the best candidates -- have sucked so bad. To finally have a good one, and not get to enjoy it because you traded away Marshawn for no reason and got Markus instead, is painful. Rebecca is an asshole about it, finding herself "unable" to "control" her "excitement," and then fakely apologizing for the outburst. Quit it, Rebecca. Alla finally crumples onto the table. "It sucks to lose, man! Never again! I'm like...AAAARRGH!"
There are delicious and well-resented snacks at Michael Kors, and then his horrible self welcomes them in. Marshawn tells us how he's "one of the best designers in the country, the world even," which he is, and then marvels how only "Janet Jackson and Britney Spears get the stores closed down for them!" But not Oprah! yells everybody not employed by Hermes Intl., and then Michael Kors tells them that Trump said they did a great job "talking about getting noticed," and how it's funny because that's what he does all day, "get people noticed, in the right way." Then everybody goes nuts, especially Marshawn, all yelling, "I need a fabulous white suit!" and "Doesn't this look like me?" and grabbing things adorably. She tells us that she couldn't focus: "There were too many clothes! Too many pretty outfits for me to try on!" She looks crazed and it's wonderful and adorable, and it's so nice to see her being a human being instead of just there, because her personality has not really come out thus far, beyond being upright and cool in the Boardroom and on tasks, and being intelligently critical in her interviews, and it turns out her personality is just as good.
Rebecca, in her customary black, says she's going to "push the boundaries" and "try on things [she] wouldn't normally try on." I love how even a shopping spree brings out her weird intensity and "I look at this as a challenge" stuff. I bet she runs marathons. She's totally a runner. She tries on hideous white space pants, as I said earlier this week, and then a weird, dark, mid-thigh dress with a plunging neckline and dramatic bell sleeves that makes her look somehow exactly like Posh Beckham, which isn't a resemblance I'd noticed before, and it's weird to see her in non-business clothes, because she's gorgeous and sexy but it still gives the mind-bending impression you get from, like, a goat in a dress, or a Tiffany lamp driving a car or doing laps in a swimming pool, or those awful Wegman portraits with the Weimaraners. I don't mean she looks bad, she looks great, I think it's just more that I've not seen her dressed like this. Like Trump with Carolyn earlier, even though I'm sure it's not the first time they've seen her dressed like that. Kors tells her it looks "amazing" on her, and then is funny about how it would look even better without the leg cast, and maybe if she had a tan.
Randal is packing some guns in the fitting room, and tells us how winning "feels great" no matter what, but that being a "two-time winner" as PM "adds a little extra spice." He comes out in a white suit and pink-pinstripe-patterned shirt and pale pink solid tie, and looks like a billion bucks. Everybody freaks out on how nice he looks. Brian looks gorgeous from the neck up and adorable from the neck down in a little boy's sweater ensemble. Rebecca is very vocal about how much she loves everyone's outfits. Marshawn tells us how wonderful it is to find herself shopping, and it's appropriately ga-ga, the way she says this, and then comes out in a crazy hot flattering black dress with a crazy glimmering medallion at the neckline. Walking home with their bags, Randal nudges Marshawn about how fun that was, and she's like, "AND we don't have to go to the Boardroom?" They all laugh.
Yeah. That. Back at the suite, Markus sits weirdly on the balcony smoking a cigar and writing down crazy thoughts about wine and who knows what else, while everyone else is packing and putting on makeup and whatever. Alla and Adam are in the bedroom, earning her the Palpatine references that have been made all week in the forums. She seizes on how Clay "went into subjects right away that weren't his to cover," which we might have known more about if we'd seen any kind of structure to the presentation, and she brings up the "slap on the ass" comment. I think there's some editorial gerrymandering going on here, because it's clear from what we do see, here and in the Boardroom, that she really wants somebody to bring up the gay stuff, and she really doesn't want to be the one to do it, so she's trying to get Adam there, but he's still stuck on the "tight-ass Jew" thing, for which I don't blame him. Well, except that he has an ample opportunity here to talk to Clay and at least fine-tune it and figure out that he needs to present it as an audience issue and not a personal attack issue. I'm also of the opinion that, while Clay was ambivalent with her last week and better this week, he's still ten times the endgame threat of Markus. (Which is to say, 10 x 0 is still 0, but who knows what could happen with Trump in charge.)
Alla gamely tries to lead Adam there for what must be at least the third time: "The goal here was to address the subject in a tasteful manner, without offending anybody." He's all, "With class, yeah." "But, getting the message across -- it's a very sensitive subject." I'd risk the opinion that her optimal plan is to crush the gay stuff and the Jewish stuff together for an unbeatable silver bullet of inappropriate, and Adam seems to get it: "He definitely offended some people in that room by making that comment about 'tight-ass Jew.' I saw eyes roll." Then we miss out on the brainwashing Alla does to get Adam obsessed with this (very true and correctly stated) point, and cut to the interview: "There's no question that his comment about me being a 'tight-ass Jew' skewed the votes. That is just not an appropriate comment to make." Just the sheer volume of times that Adam says this not precisely true statement puts me in mind of the whole Excel groupthink situation from earlier this season, like the "Green With Envy" talk-yourself-into-hype job. Alla opines that "Markus slows down the processes, he creates tension, but the fact of [it], when it comes down to it…" and Adam finishes it: "We lost because of our presentation."
Flash Quiz! Two trains going 185 kph and 236 kph are headed toward you from opposite directions. One of them freaks you out on a contact high resulting from his complete inability to verbalize or even think about sex in any way, to the degree that even hearing the word seems to hurt him physically. The other freaks you out due to his extreme and immature boundary-less ability to talk about sex in a very personal and evocative way, in an inappropriate forum.
Okay, now you're dead. Who do you blame?
A) The tight-ass Jew train.
B) The ass-obsessed gay train.
C) The guy who willfully and pissily obstructed and sabotaged the railroad-building team throughout, from drafting the railroad, to cutting the timber, to carting the timber, to laying the tracks, to wiring the warning system, and brought this situation about where there was no real plan, and all the other trains spend the entire time trying to think of what they're going to do , because there's no agenda whatsoever, because that part got short shrift due to somebody having to change his diaper and burp him every three hours?
You're right, it's a wash. That was a trick question.
There's crazy hardcore Markus music like he's in the Matrix, which no doubt he thinks he is, sitting on the balcony with his headphones in and interviewing, "I got nothing to say to anybody. I came into this game alone, we're getting into the short strokes now, and I'm ready to let the chips fall where they may." Mixed metaphor aside, you have to wonder if there's a moment in his life where he's not thinking that exact same "I came into this life alone" crap. "If anyone wants to pretend that I'm somehow of a liability, and not to look at some of the things that Clay said in that room, it's crazy! I mean absolutely nuts!" Considering he's the only person to step up and tell Clay he did okay, I find this interesting. Now that they've lost and the scapegoating is getting nitty-gritty, Markus has changed his mind about a few things. But who else is he going to blame, honestly?
Into the Boardroom again! Everybody looks scared and pissed, and Trump looks particularly toolish for some reason. Trump asks Adam, given that the class was called Sex At Work, "what went wrong?" He thinks it sounds like a "pretty good thing to choose," because "Sex is always very good, right?" Because Adam is so focused on his integrity and deep unease with sexuality, he feels the need to pipe up that he doesn't necessarily think that "sex is always very good," but that "this course was a great course." He gets kind of Rebecca around the face when he says stuff like this. Trump wonders why he lost, then, and Adam correctly states that it came down to the presentation. (Which is true, but also...was the task, so how could it not be the presentation? Preparation, delivery, content, these are all parts of the presentation, and they were all fucked up, too, actually.)
Who made the presentation bad? Clay. Clay is shocked, shocked by this assertion, but then, he doesn't have access to the Alla/Adam plans, nor does he have the full info on what he said wrong. Still. I'm sure he has gotten mostly there by this point. "Some comments that were made were very offensive, and there was one in particular that I know offended many of the audience members," all of which is within the realm of possibility. "He called me a tight-ass Jew in front of the audience."
This should not have happened. Clay should have asked for more clarification about that once they got home, and they should have been able to talk this out, so that Adam would at least A) know that he actually didn't, B) understand the stupid joke that Clay was actually trying to make, and C) fill Clay in on the fact that if Adam, who was there, thought he'd said that, so would the audience. Which would have probably ended this Boardroom a lot sooner, or at least left more room for Trump to completely blow their minds.
But since Clay is still confused about what happened -- and I blame him entirely for not following up with Adam, who I imagine is used to the idea of unthinking anti-Semitic comments, and sensitive to them to a degree that Clay has no reason to understand -- he tries to explain what happened there. He's not a fast thinker, I've said before, and he's not a fast speaker, so it comes out sounding 30% blabbering and 70% excuses, and Adam nails him on it. Even as Clay's trying to untangle the complicated linguistic fuck-ups that got him to this point, Adam just keeps hammering him about how in fact he did say it that way, and thus meant it that way, and he's wrong, but the bottom line is right, and I wish he'd fucking get there already. Although there's a pretty humorous moment where Alla nods very subtly and in a very noncommittal way to this, even though she knows damn well what Clay meant. George asks if those were his exact words, and instead of telling the truth, a simple "No," which is I think what George is after here, Clay digs ever deeper. "I did make a Jewish comment, and I did apologize." It's entirely possible that he still thinks this is the problem. I don't particularly like Clay as a person, but having watched it about a billion times, I've got to give him the benefit of the doubt, at least as far as not actually knowing what he's meant to be defending himself against.
Trump jumps on this faster than Martha on your sugar bun, all, "How do you feel about that, George? You've been called a lot of bad things…" And George -- who I still think has the right idea about where both guys' heads are at here -- simply says that something like that "has no place in the marketplace." Which is correct.
Then Trump turns a corner, and I think this is where he strokes out or has his psychotic break or whatever, because something clearly happens in his head that we can't see, at some point in this Boardroom, and I think this is where it starts.
"Not good, Clay. Are you an anti-Semite?" Which: I think you can see the point from here, Mr. Trump. Let me get your driver. Clay is, of course, not an anti-Semite. Alla, sensing how badly off-track we're getting, jumps in: "There's a lot more that he said. I mean, I'll let Adam…" which I loved, like, the implied nudge to do her bidding there, camouflaged as deference to the PM. I wonder how many times she's done this and we didn't see the secret bedroom scenes setting it up? Adam, weirdly, mentions that Clay "made a few Jewish comments throughout," which is neither what Alla was talking about, nor -- from the footage we've seen, at least -- strictly true. Which I would think they would be, if that was the theme of the evening. Clay's astounded, and so am I, because it's clear from Trump's questions that he's not really interested in pursuing this particular line of questioning.
Alla is forced to tip her hand a bit more: "Besides the Jewish comments…" and it's almost hilarious this time, because the implied like we discussed, little boy could not be more obvious. Adam bores Felisha to death ramping up to Phase II of Alla's plan, because if the kid can't even say the word "sex" without stuttering, how the hell is he supposed to say "gay"? "Besides that, the whole time I said that the underlying concept is great, but I think it's important for the team name and the image of the team that we don't make this too provocative…" That's all one sentence of Adam dancing around the gay thing. Alla should have just used Markus as her other pawn here, but she doesn't know that, because she hates him.
Carolyn, bored, goes, "So like, what were you teaching?" Alla -- still the only person with a hold on the actual idea -- explains that the class was about "how to deal with it if it's happening," and suddenly the historically silent Felisha wants a cracker: "People got a feeling of, 'Oh my gosh, this does take place in the workplace, and if it does, here are the ways that I, Miss Manners, can handle it.'" I love it inside her brain! It looks like the street with all the houses from Edward Scissorhands in there! The way she expresses things is so totally unique to her, and I think she's probably a lot of fun. Get a couple of margaritas in her or something, and all the hilarious weirdness will come flying out.
Carolyn digests: "If there is sex in the workplace, handle it with class." Cut to Trump looking like an utter troll -- an actual, literal, dwelling-under-bridges goddamn troll -- on muscle relaxants. God, I hate looking at his face. Everybody jumps in to try and explain more fully, which is always a sign of a concise, marketable concept, and Trump blurts, "I've never heard of classy sex in the workplace, that's all…" and George giggles. So does Markus, which gets Trump's attention. "Tell me what's going on with this team?" That's...gotta be a joke, Mr. Trump. You're asking for pain. Markus's response: "Um...[silence]...where do I begin...[silence]...um." He taps his fingers and Trump gets bored and rephrases: "Who caused the loss?" Markus thinks it was Clay, that he "exposed homosexuality as an issue that to me it was…" Clay is flabbergasted, and frankly so am I, because I think he's right, but you gotta be some brainless kind of mother to say it like that. He somewhat clarifies that he thought it was "a bit much for the crowd," and Clay's weird about that, but of course, if he had any idea that anyone on earth might be put off by that, he wouldn't have said it, right? He's not so unable to assume responsibility that he would paint it as their problem, would he?
Trump -- and I can't get a read on him here -- is either unimpressed, horrified, or bored as he asks whether this is true. Clay sputters, and Alla blurts, "He kept talking about slapping the ass!" It's the accent that makes it funny.
Trump goes fucking freaky nuts now: "Are you a homosexual, Clay?" Clay smiles, "I am, yes, Mr. Trump, I am." I start laughing because first of all, I'm shocked he didn't append his usual "…and I'm not afraid to say so," but also because every time somebody says that, Chris from Season Three does twenty lat pulls and watches the one straight porno he owns, then downs a Red Bull and vodka and heads off to Hooter's. Trump gets queasily into the whole gay thing, interrogating everyone in the room about whether or not they knew Clay was gay. Only the deaf-mute in the corner is even a little shocked. "Markus? Did you know? Did everybody know this? I didn't know…" He seems lost and weirded out and generally goes all Steve Carell. Carolyn laughs openly. Trump's not done. "So you don't find Alla very attractive, then?" Clay -- effed-up social skills intact -- gives a very assertive "No!" Then, a beat later, "…Uh, I mean, she's a beautiful woman…" And Trump's all, "Felisha?" He's like, "Dude, they're beautiful women, but they're not my thing." Trump has admittedly been leading me to believe he's being just a tad bit disingenuous here -- "What is this gay you speak of? Is it a Texas thing? What do they like to watch on TV? Do you like ice cream at all? Do you enjoy sports?" -- and he goes for broke. "Okay, all right. That's why they have menus in restaurants, you know? I like steak, somebody else likes spaghetti. That's why they have menus in restaurants." It's the last one that makes me think he actually has just been cold-cocked by this turn of events. Felisha starts giggling due to this powerfully wrong and hilarious turn of events. I'm like, girl, you don't even know! Alla just shakes her head disbelievingly, mortified and gleeful at once. It's such a slam-dunk home-run of awkwardness. And it's just beginning!
Markus manages to say, somewhat succinctly, that he feels that a random "cross-section of New Yorkers," none of whom knew "what class they were coming to," would necessarily feel that it was a topic they'd take a huge amount of content away from. Word, and well-said, Markus. Clearly, though, the attempt to make sense wore him out there, because in response to Trump's request for a better topic idea, he says the following words: "The topic that I was trying to form was discussing a hybrid of a time management to talk about [Alla just openly starts laughing here, and coquettishly covers her mouth] -- and that's funny, it seems, I guess -- [blah blah]" and again, I love how even after 41 years of this treatment from every single person he encounters, he still has the balls to think somebody's up in like outer space, watching and going, "Yet again Markus has been mistreated. One of these days this list of unwarranted attacks and offenses is going to earn Markus a free trip somewhere awesome."
Alla's like, "Dude, if you had only heard the way that we tried to extract the information out of Markus! Just conceptualizing his topic, he kept talking in circles! He couldn't even bring it into one concept! We couldn't even understand what he was saying!"
Clay: "That's true."
Adam: "Totally true."
Felisha: "It's all true."
Markus: "That's not true."
Everybody involved, including millions of viewers: "Oh my God!"
Markus continues fluffernutting all over: "The team had come up with a group of ideas that they wanted to pitch and I saw a certain value of getting leverage on your time…" Trump goes, "You're not speaking very well today," and Markus tangents off to explain that too, and Trump's like, "You are usually somewhat intelligible, just unable to shut up, but tonight you sound crazy -- you've got marbles in your mouth!"
Carolyn angles in on what the hell he actually did do in contribution, and his response is gorgeous: "My role was at first off I felt like the interactivity with the audience given the in my opinion the lack of the educational value was key to try to get some goodwill from the crowd," and Carolyn starts laughing immediately. George gets a little frustrated, asking him to answer any of the questions he's been asked, starting with why the team lost, and Markus says, "Okay. [silence] Is the question why did we lose?" Carolyn's all, "Yes. God!" and Felisha giggles some more. So cute. "I think that it was an ill-conceived project, I think that Adam's management of it, as far as my involvement, this guy was on me every five minutes, you're not doing this right, you're not doing that right…" So the task failed because you were unmanageable, then. Got it. Nicely done, sir. Trump's bored, and asks Adam for his two people, and of course they're Clay and Markus. Clay's not that surprised, but makes a pissy face for the practice, and Markus makes a horrifically ugly and stupid face that I can't read.
Outside, Clay's sitting pissily on the couch, his body language no less dangerous than the sound of an enraged rattlesnake...and Markus sits right down to him, oblivious as all hell, with an uppity look, and Adam is standing around awkwardly and still looking like he's going to vomit. Inside, George thinks Clay was the worst, because he was "totally insensitive as to what he was doing" and that "the key of a good executive is sensitivity to people," with which Trump and I agree, and sidesteps the whole PC issue altogether, because what Clay was in the presentation, first and foremost, was awful. Trump is pro-Adam, sensing something "solid" about him, and "some good strengths." I agree as well. Trump is utterly bugged by Markus's yakking pointlessness, and Carolyn cuts to a more important issue, his predilection for doing nothing, bitching about everything, and giving himself the "I told you so" option. She seems to see it as a strategy, though, rather than a chronic disorder that explains everything that's wrong with him. The three fellows return to the Boardroom as awkwardly as possible (and as angrily, given what a non-threatening group of wusses they are), and Trump hits us with some horrors.
"Adam, have you ever had sex before?" Carolyn is like, "Holy balls!" Adam, to his credit, answers well: "Honestly, sir? I don't feel comfortable answering that question." You just did, but way to keep your cool nonetheless. Trump -- who should know from awkward situations, having just created several doozy examples tonight already, and about to do it several more times -- asks whether Adam didn't in fact get himself into a "very bad position" talking about sex, because it's something Adam's "just not very familiar with," which is a silly way to get this underway, because: I've never been on a reality show, Anderson Cooper's never been a terrorist, and James Marsters is not, as far as I know, an actual vampire, yet we all muddle through. Adam, who is actually pretty impressive throughout, acknowledges that it was awkward at first, but that he was able to "take that difficult situation and make it into an even more productive class," and again it's like Rebecca has stepped into his body and is shining her crazy spotlights through his eyes.
Plus, and this is most important, it's not the virginity that's the problem; it's the freaky fear of all things sexual that's the problem in this particular 22-year-old. He's a very good-looking kid, but the virgin thing is not the big shocker here. It's the way he reacts to sex the way Toral does milkshakes that's the problem. Trust Trump to get this point across as horribly as possible: "How can you be afraid to talk about sex? Sex is, like, not a big deal! How can you be afraid?" Adam does not rise to this bait either, explaining evenly (if intensely) that, again, he used the time of the task to acclimate himself to the topic, and ended up "embracing" it as an "important issue" that should be discussed. Which it only is in the world of, like, Sex In The City, because in the real world, again, the answer is "NO." Much shorter conversation.
"Clay, is Adam weak?" Clay, remembering how well the whole "How's My Driving?" thing worked in Week One for denigrating Markus -- and perhaps obliquely referencing how irritatingly patient Adam was with Markus this week -- says that he is, for leading by consensus. Markus also feels that Clay is weak, which he is not, and which is funny, because they were praising him a few minutes ago.
Carolyn, smiling indulgently and frighteningly, asks Markus again what he actually did on the task, and is rewarded with some golden, priceless Markusing: "What I did was, I had talked to -- I had one -- uh -- lady speak to her…" Carolyn interrupts this obvious dead end to explain her belief that Markus subscribes to the CYA theory (Markus: "The what now?"), that he covers his ass by being useless and negative and keeping the option open of saying "I told you so."
Adam wants to speak to this, kind of indirectly, and starts off with a priceless "Ms. Kepcher" to do it: "Markus is not focused. I gave Markus all different types of responsibilities, Markus didn't fulfill [any of them]." Markus disagrees with it, and gives a short and nutty (and utterly untrue) speech about it: "In everything I do, I try to bring value, and I try to be straight with my teammates…" Trump's like, "Yeah...you didn't do much." He disagrees, of course, and Trump turns to Clay. Markus makes the most ridiculous, toad-like, lip-pooched assface he's made yet, and Clay tries to explain the whole "blockbuster ideas" scenario, about how he had to explain to Alla that Markus is literally incapable of making lists, and instead likes to make a huge mishmash in his very confused head of every thought he's ever had, which then comes shooting weirdly out of his face. In the soda pop game, we call that a "Suicide." Just saying.
Seeing Markus open his mouth, Trump hurriedly asks Adam why he lost. Adam jumps on the Jewish comment again, and then finally clarifies it: "From a personal level, I accepted his apology and I really don't believe he's anti-Semitic in any way shape or form…" Trump interrupts him right before the point about how that's "a big statement [he's] making," but only to Trump, because the actual point is forthcoming: "But, I think that we lost because of the low scores, and he mentioned some provocative things…" So close, right, so close to making his actual point here, but again George jumps in, all, "Sex is provocative! So you're saying you don't want anything provocative?" Which is still not the point Adam's making, but closer to it, and Adam is sidetracked into how he wanted it "tasteful, respectful," and that's when Clay's ass got saved this week, because Adam let himself get snookered into never making his point. George, pleased with this opportunity to answer a question nobody asked, is like, "Doesn't happen. Sex by itself is provocative."
Then: POW! Trump's all creepy-old-uncle Bar Mitzvah all of a sudden: "George, listen. Adam isn't good with sex," and he turns to Adam: "You might be in ten years, but right now you don't feel comfortable with sex, do you agree with that?" Adam agrees with this self-evident statement and Trump goes NUTS. "You will. Someday you will. It's gotten me into a lot of trouble, Adam. It's cost me a lot of money. Do you understand that?"
WHAT THE FUCK PART OF ANY OF THIS IS OKAY? THE ONLY PERSON YOU'RE ALLOWED TO PULL THIS ON IS YOUR KID, YOUR OWN PERSONAL CHILD, AND EVEN THEN YOU BETTER BE COOLER ABOUT IT THAN THIS. I FEEL LIKE I JUST GOT THE TALK FROM MY ABDUCTOR, OKAY, AND I WASN'T EVEN THERE. YOU SICK, WEIRD, CREEPY PIECE OF CRAP.
Plus, plus the fact that I take severe issue with the idea that Trump is speaking with any kind of authority about sex. He's had intercourse, yes, and it's cost him a lot, but -- do you honestly think Trump enjoys sex qua sex? Do you think that's where it stops, for him? He's the guy Viagra was invented for, because for him sex equals a whole lot of stuff that has nothing to do with sex and a whole lot to do with making his dead father happy and a bunch of other gross stuff, and probably getting peed on. Trump doesn't have sex, he masturbates using another person. I'm sorry if this paragraph blew your mind, but I wasn't the one that crossed the line here, and it's about ten times ickier that he's trying to get Adam to sign onto this fake idea of sex that he doesn't even actually care about except as a signifier of stuff we already knew about him.
Carolyn giggles disgustedly and thinks about how later on, after dinner at the Club, she's going to go home and sit on a big-ass pile of money. Even Markus is like, is this actually happening? It goes on. "You'll probably be there, in some respects I hope that you are, because there's nothing like it." I don't even know what he means by all this, but I feel violated. Adam says quietly, "Thank you very much," then pulls out a gun and shoots himself in the head forty-six times. Trump turns to Markus: "Markus, you talk too much. You talk in riddles! And for this task, you didn't do a very good job." Markus thinks he did "an outstanding job," but couldn't tell you why. "Part of your problem," Trump ruminates, and everyone braces for more scary, crazy, gross-out talk, "is that you always have an excuse. And you can't shut up." True that.
Back to the case not at all at hand: "Clay, I really believe that you are not anti-Semitic. I felt very relieved when Adam said he believed you were not anti-Semitic, because you've gone through a lot being gay, and you've gone through your own form of discrimination." Please email me if you can explain that comment to me. Apparently Clay gets what he's talking about, because his response, which is safe as houses and relates to Trump's crazy talk, is this: "Nobody deserves to be discriminated against." A tiny star shoots across the screen and we see the NBC logo and the slogan, "You'll probably be there, in some respects I hope that you are," and David Hyde Pierce says softly, "There's nothing like non-discrimination. And that's one to grow on." Trump continues awesomely: "Nevertheless, you did a horrible job and that wasn't good."
He swings back to Adam, who flinches a tiny bit. "Adam. You're very soft. You're young, you're inexperienced -- I don't know if you deserve to go on." Adam responds, and I flinch a little bit: "I do and I'd like to prove to you that I am not soft. I do have a hard core, and I can do those negotiations," and basically he's a huge, rock-hard asset to the Trumpanies. This is all very Miss Tyra, how he's all, "In my hands I have photos of two beautiful girls, but three of you stand before me" and making them wait so he can tell them why they're all fuck-ups. Finally, he gets to Markus. "Look, the problems that we've got with Markus: so many words! So much talk! So much nonsense! Not getting to the point!" are all the issues that make Mr. Trump feel that he would never, in a million years, no matter how hard up he was, ever want to work with Markus. Which is like the truest and best reason he's ever given for a firing: "I hate being around you, so why would I invite you to spend time with me?" He fires Markus, and Adam's like, "Buh-mwahh?" and Clay's adrenaline high is such that I don't think he's really noticing much of what's going on, just trying to get his lip to stop shaking.
They get up to leave, and Trump -- who really ought to know better -- wishes him luck. Here we fucking go. "If you mean it," Markus fnurs. "I don't think you do." George is like, "Bitch said what?" but Trump thinks it's hilarious. "It's been a railroad from the beginning," says Markus. "A railroad?" asks Trump, obligingly. "Yeah, it has." Carolyn looks at him like Martha Stewart would look at a wet rainboot on her floor. "Markus," Trump stupidly tries again, "you talk too long, too much, and you say the wrong things." Markus disagrees and starts to explain how Trump has no way of knowing that, and Trump's finally like, "Okay whatever Markus, just leave. I think you're a nice guy." Markus babbles all the way out the door, but at least he leaves without security getting involved.
Adam boards the elevator, where Clay stands menacingly, then hisses out at Adam, "Don't talk to me." Upstairs, Clay leads the way back to the suite pulling his little orange rolling suitcase, then slams the door open crazily. Adam comes up nervously from behind, and I about freak out because I cannot freaking wait for the conclusion and unending aftermath of this stuff week. Hissy in the hizzy!
Markus tools onto the elevator as Trump and the Viceroys reiterate the points they just made, and then downstairs, the doorman is relieved that Markus passes him with just a nod. In the Crazy Taxi, Markus says these things: "I think that the team took advantage of my ideas the the the the people you know [silence] see how to say it [silence, cut to exterior of cab to show passage of time, silence] you know the you know the I mean you know it's I uh speak intelligently and I speak to the point I speak to the details and I do feel I do go into detail and uh I tried to step up and do the right thing and um I'm I you know where when you've done all you can do where do you go from there I don't have a clue."
Heard that, good buddy. Good luck.
Ha! I totally didn't mean that! Actually, and I mean this in a nice way, I do hope that one day he fails badly enough to notice, because I think that's his one chance of getting it together in any way. There's always a chance, mister.
If Randal and Marshawn -- and even Trump, this week -- have taught us anything, it's this: Get To The Point. Figure out the point, and then get there. For Markus, this problem is endemic. For the Sex At Work presentation, it was the fatal flaw: no point, no clear way to get there. Even Adam could have wrapped that shit up in five seconds if he'd gotten to the point faster. But keep in mind that the point is never, ever going to be talking about sex with Donald Trump, because that's the one place nobody is ever going to want to go. And sadly, now we've all been there. See what happens when you go off-message? See the damage you can cause? See the lives simply going off-topic can destroy? Learn, if you can, from what happened here tonight.