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NBC fires Stewart's 'Apprentice'
Show has struggled in the ratings

Monday, November 14, 2005; Posted: 9:04 a.m. EST (14:04 GMT)

LOS ANGELES, California (Hollywood Reporter) -- It's a fade out for "The Apprentice: Martha Stewart" after next month's finale.

Sources said that NBC has passed on ordering another round of episodes of the Stewart-hosted edition of "The Apprentice," which has struggled in the ratings since its September 21 premiere. A spokesman for NBC stressed Sunday that the show always had been scheduled to run for only one cycle.

NBC and "Apprentice" executive producer Mark Burnett tapped Stewart to helm the spinoff in an effort to capitalize on public curiosity about the lifestyle maven after her release this year from a five-month prison term for lying to investigators in connection with an insider-trading stock probe. Plans for Stewart to host the spinoff were announced in February while Stewart was behind bars in West Virginia.

Like the original "Apprentice" and its gregarious entrepreneur host Donald Trump, Stewart's version of the show set up a competition among 16 would-be executives to win a $250,000 prize and a year-long "apprenticeship" job at Stewart's Martha Stewart Living Omnimedia company. Stewart's panel of judges each week include Charles Koppelman, chairman of the board at MSLO, and her daughter, MSLO consultant Alexis Stewart.

While Trump's "Apprentice" was an instant hit last year on its debut, Stewart's opened with little sizzle, drawing just 7.1 million viewers, according to Nielsen Media Research. For the season-to-date, the show has averaged 6.8 million viewers.

"Apprentice: Martha Stewart" opened the season for NBC in the Wednesday lead-off slot, and then shifted to 9 p.m. in the line of fire of one of primetime's biggest hits, ABC's "Lost," as of October 5. Its two-hour live finale is set for December 21.

Burnett and Stewart also are partnered with NBC Universal in a daytime syndicated show, "Martha," which has delivered fair to middling ratings since its September premiere.

Tommy Ceez

How much did Sirius pay her again?

Giles

I think it would be funny if they just brandish this off to Saturday/Friday night death land where no one will care or watch it for that matter.

Septemberbaby

I'm just grateful they're going to air the rest of the season.
I'm enjoying this one more than Donald's.
I've never been a fan of Martha's.. but I have to give her credit.
She seems to have come out smelling like a rose.

Giles

a rose with a ankle bracelet.

kms_md

what will the donald blame his poor ratings on now?

LiquidSky

I must admit that this show is a guilty pleasure of mine.

Giles

'Joey' ?

Bill Needle

Good news. Now they'll have a timeslot open for The Apprentice: Tara Reid.

Jadzia

I was thinking it would be cool if they did The Apprentice: Oprah, and you could have it take place in Chicago.

I think this show would benefit from a change in scenery.

I also liked Martha's show better than the Donald's this season.

Timber

Yeah this show has been far better then Donald's this season. The tasks are just soo much better. What it lacks is a strong presence in the "conference room" like Donald is in his board room.

Giles

oh please no

Morf

Maybe they will replace it with Arrested Development, picked up from Fox.

al_bundy

Donald has improved over the last few seasons. A few seasons ago most of the episodes were about running a quick 1 day business like washing dogs or quickly fixing up a house. This time there is more real world tasks like making marketing campaigns.

DaveNinja

I dont really like either of them but i like this one more than trumps.

Bill Needle

I prefer Trump's by far after viewing this one a couple times. The "contest" portion of both shows is actually pretty consistently lame, save for the occasional psychotic episode. Trump (and by that I mean the Trump board room) is really the only reason to watch The Apprentice. No Trump, no show.

djbrown

Maybe the next "reward" can be the team stopping by Martha's garden to throw dirt on top the series....

al_bundy

Trump has the best firings by far. I'm still waiting for Martha to apologize for firing someone.

FantasticVSDoom

Does this mean now its time for NBC to bring in Scrubs??

Grimm1

They had to expect the ratings would suck with it being up against LOST.

chowderhead

for a while, it was on at 8pm going up against Lost reruns and the comedies on CBS, the dancing show/Baseball on Fox, top models on UPN and One tree hill on WB - not exactly the toughest time slot. Still, I would have had some separation between the two shows say slotted Mondays at 8pm - and started Surface to 8pm on Wednesday at the beginning of the season. Anyway, the two shows are fading because the tasks are reptitive and balant ads. The drama is lame and really, one person (in conjunction with the producers) can make arbituary decisions and eliminations.

You just know that yawn - both shows are boring.

Giles

on Thursday nights where it's supposed to be.

CPA-ESQ.

True - you can even tell by the editing and