Apprentice - final five bios

[zico]

Quick review of the “Final Five” which is an extra programme where we get to find out the life journeys of the final 5 contestants, so we can empathise more with them at the “interviews from hell” stage.

Scarlett had a very tough upbringing, made some iffy decisions in her teenage years, then some tough decision to get back on track, and now works in recruitment consultancy. She is admired by all her workmates (and us viewers) for her sheer hard work and tenacity.

Lewis had a brief teenage career as a superstar DJ, then became a 18-30 club rep, which seems to be an ideal vocation for him (exhibitionism, blagging, ducking and diving). But he gave it all up to get a marketing degree and now does telemarketing (cold-calling) from a boxy office in an industrial park. His boss tells us that Lewis often mentions just how great Lewis is at his job, but his colleagues all seem to like him.

Lottie’s background is a major shock as it turns out she’s a spoilt little rich girl. Who could have guessed? Reading between the lines, seems like she was a real daddy’s girl. Her mother speaks admiringly of Lottie’s qualities of dominating her little sister and always getting her own way in whatever she wants. Remember, this is her mother looking for Lottie’s best qualities. Lottie is an Air Force Cadet, and at 17 years of age, Lottie applied to join the armed forces, but the strict discipline, regimentation, harshness, yelling, bullying, criticism, lack of empathy – well, it was just too much for the army. She’s only 19 so absolutely has to mellow with age. I half-suspect she’s been asked to play up the more confrontational parts of her characters for the Apprentice, but maybe what we see is what we get with Lottie.

There’s a chance for us to find out about Pamela here, which is more than we’ve done in the last couple of months of watching the Apprentice. Pamela’s mother is in the beauty industry, and Pamela herself set up a nail bar in Dublin at the age of 16 which sounds to be doing pretty well. We hear that she approached the editor of American Vogue and said “the fingernails of the model on your front cover are awful. I’d do them better” and she got taken on to do the nails for future covers – impressive, if true. Pamela comes across as a nice, bubbly person with also a lot of determination.

Carina is from a big Italian family. She had 10 years at M&S management, being described as a rough diamond with lots of energy by her former workmates. Her dad’s bakery business burnt down in a fire, so she put her life savings into building a new bakery/café business jointly with her father, which is doing pretty well. Carina seems the most likeable of the final 5.

I'll be doing about the interviews in a while.