The Apprentice has turned out to be one of the biggest shows ever for
Mark Burnett Productions, creating an unlikely new reality TV star in
the shape of Donald Trump and making " You’re fired! " the hottest
catchphrase of the year.
But it hasn’t been easy reaching the boardroom each week where The
Donald pronounces the fate of the surviving contestants, explains Jay
Bienstock, co-executive producer. "The series runs 14 episodes and it
all has to be taped as we shoot 24/7, following the 16 candidates all
hoping to become Donald Trump’s apprentice for a year. If we’d done it
real-time, it’d take forever and for obvious reasons it’s very boring
to watch people sleep and so on, so the basic format is fairly
conventional. We shoot, we edit and then post. But it’s a lot of work
and planning."
For the final cliffhanger episode, however, the team decided to do a
live show, "primarily for secrecy and the element of surprise," reports
Bienstock. "Part of what drives this show, just like Survivor, is that
you don’t know what’s going to happen, and we wanted to keep it that
way."
Going live necessitated some big changes. "Audiences have been used to
watching the show from the outside looking in, like a fly on the wall,
whereas for the live show, you’re actually part of it and right in the
mix," Bienstock explains. "So for one version, you’re doing all the
lighting and sound work for tape, and then for the final show it’s all
being redone for live."
Even though every show apart from the finale is taped, the crew never
does pick-ups or reshoots. "So it’s live to tape in that sense," he
notes, "while the final show is live to live. And Donald and his
associates and the final candidates are used to doing the show on a
set, not in front of a live audience, so that changes our approach too.
"Basically, the final live show is another whole animal, and because
it’s such a complex and huge technical undertaking, we hired Al Berman
as the live show producer because he’s so experienced with this sort of
production."
Berman, whose producing credits include The Early Show for CBS and all
the live Survivor shows, came on board early enough to coordinate all
the technical aspects. "Many audience members don’t realize the series
is shot months ahead— they think it’s happening that week, so the live
show has to continue that feeling of seamlessness," he reports.
"There’s also continuity challenges, as the series is shown over
several months and people put on weight, change hairstyles, get tans,
and so on."
The live shoot took place on the Saturday Night Live stage, so director
Michael Simon and lighting designer Simon Miles used the studio’s Sony
700s and Sony 750s for handheld and Steadicam shots. Lenses used for
the live show include standard lenses as well as Canon’s J20X SUPER and
J11ax4.5B ultra-wide. Standard lenses were used on the series. "
Michael has to punch 13 cameras live, so it’s a very sophisticated
toolset that he brings to this. We also have 20 people wearing
microphones, each on their own wireless, so mixing the audio is also a
big job," adds Berman.
In addition to the main audio mixer, Bob Palladino, there’s also a
separate sub mixer, Chris Costello. "His only job is to make sure the
proper wireless mics are open and all the rest are closed," says
Berman. "That’s very tricky to do." The audio team also includes music
mixer Josiah Cluck and nine audio assistants.
Gayle DePoli, technical manager for the live show, reports that to get
all of the frequencies cleared in the NBC building, "we had to mix and
match our gear." The microphone heads used were all matched Sennheiser
MKE 2s, coupled with Sennheiser SK50-U and SK3063-U RF transmitters. To
meet certain frequency requirements, the production also made use of
Shure U4D dual-channel wireless receivers. The show’s audio gear was
provided by Wireless First in NY and coordinated with NBC’s in-house RF
staff.
In case any wireless mics fail, the team also used hardwired back-ups.
"In fact, we use back-up systems for all our gear," Berman says. "All
tape rolls of previous excerpts that are shown in the live show are put
on a Profile digital playback machine. In case that goes down, we have
another system rolling at the same time so we’re already cued on the
tape and there’ll only be a delay of four or five seconds."
Further complicating the live show was a 10-second delay put on the
broadcast by NBC. "That gives them the chance to bleep out anything
objectionable, and it makes it a little tricky syncing the show with
the network and all their commercials," Berman adds. "We also have to
start our show 10 seconds early."
Projection for the live audience and wide beauty shots used a Barco SLM
R10 projector with eight-foot-wide Stumpfi screens provided by
Scharff-Weisberg in New York. All other gear came from NBC Studio 8-H’s
inventory.
"For a reality TV show, our approach to doing the live finale is
unusually sophisticated and high-end," Berman says. "We’ve got the best
equipment and the best people in the business who were available to do
this show, and it pays off. You get a look that is very polished and
everything from the lighting design to the audio and camera work is top
notch. Obviously you need a bigger budget to do this, but it’s also a
matter of aiming for the very highest standard possible."
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