I Want to Work for Diddy: Stefanie’s Guide on How Not to Give a Presentation

So I know I totally dropped the ball on these I Want to Work for Diddy recaps. Sorry bout that. But since this week was the finale — and since Gossip Girl was a rerun, giving me more free time — I thought a final recap was in order. So who actually will work for Diddy? Time to find out.

“You just wasted 2 months of your life watching this crap! HAHAHA!”

Previously: Capricorn may have been secretly banging Red, for she threw a shit fit when he was eliminated for sucking in the nightclub challenge despite that being his actual real job; Boris was eliminated after he accused Kendra of plotting to murder someone and possibly the judges at well; and Kendra was eliminated for just gasping in disbelief at Boris’s accusations and silently debating the pros and cons of strangulation versus electrocution instead of defending herself.

This leaves us with Suzanne, Stefanie, Poprah, and Mike still in the running. On last week’s episode, they were given the assignment to plan an event for Bad Boy artist Janelle Monae. On top of that, all four finally found themselves truly acting as Diddy’s assistants, having to cater to his every whim and even accompanying him on his run through Central Park (something Poprah’s “asthma” got her out of again). Poprah’s main task throughout the episode was to coordinate the guest list for the event, which proved to be nearly impossible as other people within Bad Boy refused to give her information despite repeated requests. By the end of the episode, Poprah still didn’t have a guest list when Diddy demanded it from her personally, and she smarted off a bit, saying she can’t invent it so WTF did he want her to do? Well what he wanted is for her to take her dumb ass out the door, so he told her she wasn’t ready to work for Diddy. So is Poprah really fired, or was that just a clever cliffhanger?

We open up exactly where it ended last week — Diddy firing Poprah, while everyone in the room stares in shock. Poprah tries to backtrack and explain again why she doesn’t have the guest list, but Diddy isn’t hearing it, politely but firmly telling her to get the hell out. He leaves and is replaced by disapproving Capricorn and Norma, who lecture Poprah on being insubordinate while Poprah struggles to not slap them across their faces. Using a fakely sweet voice that borders on condescending, Poprah repeatedly insists she wasn’t being rude, but Cap and Norm disagree and tell her that her tone was inappropriate. Poprah finally gives up, tells them her firing was a “mutual decision.” Whatever helps you sleep at night.

She’s escorted out by security, waving at people throughout Bad Boy like she’s Miss America, and answering Mike’s phone call only to tell him she doesn’t work for Diddy anymore and that she can’t help him. In the elevator, she hits on the security guards, then goes on about how Diddy wanted to get rid of her for being over rather than under qualified, how one day Diddy will work for her, and other rantings of the delusional. Ugh, shut your trap. Thank God she’s finally gone!

“God this bitch never shuts up… but I’d probably hit that.”

“Yeah… me too.”

With only three people now left, the workload has gotten even heavier and deadlines even tighter. Mike’s in charge of going to the venue for the event and getting it cleaned and organized. Suzanne’s taken over the guest list and is working the door as the scrawniest bouncer alive. Stefanie is Janelle Monae’s bitch, and is trying to frantically clean her dressing room before she arrives, and stock it with Janelle’s favorites — Fiji water, natural honey, and pictures of Michael Jackson circa 1979 when he was rocking the same hairstyle Janelle has today.

But when Diddy and Janelle arrive, the entire showcase goes on without a hitch. Mike, Suzanne and Stefanie move quickly behind the scenes, taking care of hundreds of tiny little tasks with apparent ease. In fact, the only thing noteworthy about this entire segment is that Diddy acts like a goof when introducing Janelle, and Janelle’s music is God-awful.

The next morning, the contestants are still working on some of Diddy’s smaller personal requests when they get a special red phone message telling them they each must give a presentation to Diddy that afternoon on why they should be hired. Knowing she’s bad at public speaking, Stefanie seems the most nervous. This will be totally different than that time she ran for Party Coordinator Chair for Delta Gamma.

Shortly after that, a hottie named Marcus comes in to help them prepare their presentations. He plays their original interview for them, to point out what they did wrong and what they did right. He tells Suzanne not to claim she’s “down” because only people who aren’t down claim they’re down. She’s also about 2 decades too old to talk like that. With Stefanie, Marcus points out how horribly nervous she appeared, and how she just stopped completely at one point and apologized. She probably caught her reflection in someone’s glasses and got distracted. He advises her that she needs to convince Diddy she’s a quick learner because she doesn’t have any experience compared to the other two. As for Mike, Marcus merely tells him not to wear sunglasses and act like a huge douchebag this time around.

“Truth of the matter is none of you are qualified, but I’ll help as much as I can.”

After Marcus leaves, they get yet another red phone message — they each have to bring three objects to their presentation which exemplify what they would bring to Bad Boy. They are each given $200, but only have 1 hour to go shopping. Mike and Stefanie run out of the door like it’s free burrito day at Chipotle, but Suzanne stays back at the apartment, telling us she doesn’t need to waste Diddy’s money on crap when she can find three perfect objects she already owns. I actually think that’s a very smart idea, at least after seeing how it’s going for Stefanie and Mike. Stefanie decides to reinforce the young, inexperienced image she already has by buying toys. Brilliant, Stef. Why not also get some diapers and a pacifier and call it a day? Mike, on the other hand, races into Barnes and Noble, where he awesomely wipes out and crashes into an escalator. It’s amazing and I tried to screencap it, but the boy goes down way too quickly. Yep, definitely was smarter to stay at the apartment.

At Bad Boy, hottie Marcus is now meeting with Diddy to talk about the final three. Diddy complains that Mike messed up on a lot of the small personal tasks, but got stronger when he got yelled at rather than crumpling under pressure. Marcus’s take on Mike is that Mike’s arrogant and confident, and needs to decide whether he wants to use his skills to serve Diddy or himself. Turning to Suzanne, Marcus says that while she doesn’t have the charisma, she’s more focused and gets flustered the least. Diddy disagrees, arguing that Suzanne got the most flustered in the last challenge. As for Stefanie, Diddy calls her a deer in headlights, but one who does take direction well once she’s shaken out of it. Marcus agrees somewhat, but warns Diddy that she’ll need the most molding and training given her inexperience. Based on that conversation, I think Stefanie’s the frontrunner.

Who?

Time for the presentations. Capricorn, Kevin, Midget face Phil, and Diddy himself take their seats, and Mike is up first. He begins with a typical interviewee sales pitch, then tries to connect to Diddy by mentioning his own humble roots and the determination it took to get where he is today. Yes, filling out reality TV show applications is the pinnacle of success. I like Mike, but he comes off so slimey in interviews to me. For his items, the first one is a Bible for unexplained reasons. The second is a picture of his parents, which supposedly keeps him grounded. And the third is some unidentified book about reaching for your dreams, which he gives Diddy and will probably be used as a coaster and then tossed. Congratulations, Mike, you’re an unmemorable walking cliche.

Suzanne comes off as the most nervous and stilted to me. Her first item is the envelope of money from a few challenges ago when they had to earn as much cash on the street as possible. Her second item is the Sean John sunglasses she won when her team won the billboard competition. Her third is her passport, saying that she’s seen a lot of the world and been blessed. I understand that her first two items show how successful she was throughout the competition (which she actually wasn’t but this is selective editing), but she lost me with the passport. What the hell that passport has to do with how she’d be a good employee or what she’d bring to the table is beyond me. Maybe she was trying to show Diddy that she’s a master of foreign languages and can find him a hooker no matter which country they’re in.

Stefanie, wearing a really distracting scarf-noose, starts off pretty well despite her public speaking fears, claiming that she can “cultivate imaginations” — whatever the hell that means — as well as be persuasive and adaptable. Stefanie’s first object is a stiletto-heeled shoe, which represents her because when she wears it, she’s forcing herself into uncomfortable situations and that’s what she does as an employee. I know what she means and what she’s trying to say, but the way she phrased it made her sound insecure and like she’s dragging her feet but makes herself go through with things. Her second object is a puzzle, which she explains by saying that someone who can complete a puzzle is someone who has a vision. Or someone who’s in kindergarten because you bought that at a toy shop. Her final item is a jack-in-the-box, which she claims is always a surprise and she wants to surprise Diddy as his assistant. Again, I know what she means but I don’t think many employers want their employees to surprise them. “Hey boss, I didn’t finish that assignment you gave me and I’m not coming in today because I’m totally hungover from meeting some girls from my sorority for happy hour last night. Surprise!” Yeah, not exactly what they want

“This red stiletto represents me because, well, I’m a little slutty sometimes.”

However, Stefanie’s problems run a little deeper than poor explanations, as Diddy physically reacts to the monkey that pops out of the jack-in-the-box and tersely asks Stefanie to put it back inside. She teasingly asks him if he’s scared, but he’s not — he’s offended as he repeatedly calls the monkey “Sambo.” I admit, I have never heard that term before and had to do a little internetestigating to learn it’s a racial slur. Whoopsie. She has no idea what the word Sambo means either, as she innocently continues on with her presentation until he starts rambling about black face and white face and monkeys. At first, it looks like she thinks he’s lost his mind, but eventually it clicks in her head and she valiantly tries to stay upbeat, something which I give her major credit for. How mortifying.

Stefanie finishes and leaves the room, while the judges all crack up over how that was not what they were expecting. Diddy calls her whole presentation blatantly sexual, and Kevin doesn’t think Stefanie is built for the industry. However, Capricorn somewhat defends her, calling her fresh and young. The judges then begin talking about Suzanne, agreeing that she’s somewhat invisible. Kevin is her main supporter, arguing that she is experienced, grounded and will be a good influence on others in the company. With Mike, Capricorn admits she had an issue with him from day 1, with him acting arrogant and cheesy, but Phil backs Mike up, arguing that Mike wants it the most and will give the most.

They bring in the final three to eliminate it down to two. I honestly have no idea who’s about to get eliminated, but I would probably eliminate Stefanie for being too young and inexperienced. And it’s Stefanie who gets eliminated! I really think she has potential, for all my cracks about her age, but she is just not ready yet.

“Oh, God, I should have picked the black strappy mary jane to show how I strap on work and buckle down to get things done!”

Back at the house, Mike and Suzanne are relaxing when they get a red phone message instructing them to pack up and get out of the apartment because Diddy is going on vacation. They arrive at Bad Boy to find racks of clothing and mounds of suitcases awaiting. Their final task is to pack up all of Diddy’s shit in one hour, without wrinkling or otherwise messing any of it up. Everything also needs to be inventoried, and one of them has to run out to go buy something. Thank God I’m not competing on this show. My version of packing is to shove everything in, then sit on the suitcase to get it to close. Sometimes it even takes a few bounces.

They go to work on the packing, but Mike quickly has to leave to go to the grocery store for snacks for Diddy. In the process, he nearly runs an elderly woman over with his grocery cart. Out of the way, hag, Diddy needs a roast beef sandwich! Back at Bad Boy, Suzanne decides to abandon their original system of taking photographs of all of Diddy’s crap, as she realizes there’s not enough time to do that and get it all in the bags. Instead she focuses on packing by category and keeping a running list of what kinds of items are in each bag. When Mike returns, they’re so low on time they wind up shoving some of the stuff in haphazardly, rationalizing that they’ll have time to fix it when they get to the airport.

At the airport, Mike and Suzanne physically pack all the bags within the cargo area of the private jet, despite the pilot protesting that it won’t all fit. They finally make it work just as a helicopter arrives, with Diddy, Capricorn with some very misguided apricot leggings, and midget face Phil aboard. Mike and Suzanne immediately know this is the final elimination, right here, right now. Overall, I think Suzanne is the better candidate, but I think Mike will win because he fits so much better within the Bad Boy image. After rehashing each of their strengths and weaknesses, Diddy announces he has a question — then turns to Suzanne and asks if she’s ready to come with him! So Suzanne wins! She’s in shock, and so is Mike, as he politely thanks everyone and shakes their hands before quickly turning and walking away. Before he leaves, Suzanne tries to say goodbye but he pretty much blows her off.

“I love you, Mike. Did you hear what I said? I said, I love you, Mike.”

“Suck my cock and die, bitch.”

Suzanne, Diddy and the rest get on the plane, which starts taxing down the runway. But just when you think it’s all over, the plane stops and Whitney Houston Diddy appears in the doorway. Kevin Costner Mike immediately perks up, and flat out runs over to Diddy when called. Turns out Mike was right to get excited — Diddy tells him he’s got plenty of need for assistants, so he should come too! So both Suzanne and Mike won!

So that’s it for I Want to Work for Diddy! What did you think? Would you have picked Mike, Suzanne, both or neither? If neither, which one of all the candidates would have been your pick? I think Suzanne actually would be my choice, partially because Mike’s too attractive for me to work closely with without getting distracted. Are you surprised Poprah got fired? Did she deserve it?And do you think Mike and Suzanne will still have their jobs when Diddy sees the way they packed his clothes?

Sorry again for the recap hiatus I had to take, but I hope you enjoyed this finale wrap up!

–LoLo