Martha Stewart Brings Back Letter Writing

So, Martha Stewart showed her Apprentice colors last night, and they were muted, tasteful, beautifully coordinated and a bit...boring. There are no noveau rococo apartment buildings, no tacky candidates, no blustering, and no George. But the Starrett-Lehigh building looks amazing. The task was to create a children's book by updating an old fairy tale classic. We'll spare you the details for all of you who Tivo'd the show and will just concentrate on the most insane thing about the show: After Martha fires someone, she writes them a handwritten note. She uses Martha Stewart Omnimedia letterhead (she's not wasting her personal engraved stationery on these chumps) and gets to work as soon as the last wheely suitcase has gone (and we blurred out who the letter is to, so no complaining about spoilers). What Gothamist was struck by was the fact that Martha's handwriting slanted, making the letter look sloppy. Why no lightbox with lined paper underneath? Why no paper with lines lightly penciled in, later to be erased by a production assistant? Did they shoot the letter writing scene a number of times, with this letter being the best one? All said, the handwritten note is a nice, if cruel touch. We've never received a handwritten note when we were fired; just enough mental anguish of how horrible our time in that employ was.

Both the New York Times and Newsday fixate on the letter. Also, what is with George wanna-be Charles Koppelman holding an unlit cigar all the time? Does he have oral fixation or something? And the new season of Donald Trump's Apprentice premieres tonight - and there's a stripper.