Donald Trump: Riding back in to help rescue NBC

Donald Trump isn't likely to hear "You're fired!" from NBC anytime soon.

The business tycoon continues to give the beleaguered network some of its brightest spots with his "Apprentice" reality-competition series, and he's set to launch the third edition of "The Celebrity Apprentice" Sunday, March 14.

"We're their big baby," Trump tells Zap2it, "and you'll see that during the Winter Olympics, because they'll advertise it like wild. We're a successful show, and they like that. I'm in the real-estate business and in business generally, and the Miss Universe and Miss USA pageants (which Trump owns) do really great, but 'The Apprentice' is bigger than all of it."

The newest group of celebrities to convene in the boardroom will include former Illinois governor Rod Blagojevich, Sharon Osbourne, singer Cyndi Lauper, comedian Sinbad and athletes Darryl Strawberry and Michael Johnson. They weren't chosen randomly, since Trump realizes "it's about ratings. You can be nice, not nice or any kind of person you want to be, as long as you get great ratings."

Trump reports that next season, NBC may want both "The Apprentice" and "The Celebrity Apprentice" from him. Though he enjoys dealing with other famous people, he's also looking forward to interacting with "regular" people as contestants again. And in both cases, he likes having a big audience.

"It's really cool," Trump admits. "You're on in front of millions of people at least once a week. A very great person who's in the business told me, 'You don't give up television, television gives up on you' ... so it's cool, as long as you can keep it going."

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Related:

'Celebrity Apprentice's' Rod Blagojevich: 'I wasn't interested in a "Keeping Up With the Kardashians"'
'Celebrity Apprentice' cheat sheet: Who's who?


Photo credit: NBC