Last updated at 12:52, Monday, 02 April 2012

TV is full of people being high-powered and driven. And the king of cut-throat telly is surely The Apprentice.

What delight there is in seeing vast egos pricked when contestants’ boasts are rendered hollow. And what boasts they are.

The new series has already revealed that one would-be apprentice regards himself as a shark. Another is a killer whale.

The most infamous example is Stuart Baggs, who in the 2010 series declared: “I’m not a one-trick pony, I’m not a 10-trick pony, I’m a whole field of ponies – and they’re literally all running towards this job.”

What this world needs is someone to deflate it. And who better than Grace Dent?

This journalist, author, and broadcaster grew up in Currock, Carlisle, and attended Bishop Goodwin and Caldew Schools.

She now writes for publications including The Guardian and Marie Claire.

Grace was a guest on last week’s edition of The Apprentice: You’re Fired.

This spin-off show features the contestant who has just been sacked.

Grace was one of the panellists who saw Maria O’Connor reflecting on her dismissal, which occurred largely because she had fallen asleep on the job, as it were.

In Apprentice-land, falling asleep when you could be earning money is a terrible crime.

Grace didn’t see it that way. “I like a nap,” she confided.

She also told Maria: “I knew you would go after two minutes. You were too gobby.”

And she had the nerve to suggest that being on The Apprentice is not the greatest privilege imaginable.

“I think you’ve had a lucky escape.”

Good stuff from Grace, who once interviewed Engelbert Humperdinck about his bathroom for a lifestyle magazine.

She asked him if he ever got locked in the loo and sang Please Release Me.

“He didn’t laugh.”

First published at 11:28, Monday, 02 April 2012
Published by http://www.newsandstar.co.uk