After appearing on The Celebrity Apprentice (with Episode 906 still streaming on nbc.com until June 6), the country cutie-pie doesn’t own up to having any inside information, but is more than willing to predict which contestants will persevere down the stretch toward the May 23 live finale. And trying to resist having any foolish notions that might be a result of living in this cynical society.
“Well, I’m rooting for Bret (Michaels) to get his health back and I hear he’s feeling better,” West said of the rock star who has since been released from Barrow Neurological Institute at St. Joseph's Hospital in Phoenix and is expected to make a complete recovery from a brain hemorrhage suffered April 21. “And I think that he might win. I don’t know, though. I think that Curtis Stone is a very good-looking man (laughs).
“I think that Sharon Osbourne, Cyndi or Bret Michaels will win. I don’t know ... I don’t like to start anything ... but I don’t know if the thing is a publicity stunt. ’Cause I think he’s gonna be fine. I’ve been praying for him. But I don’t think it is. I think it really is happening, you know. He’s been in the hospital for so long. ...”
While Michaels, 47, (pictured with West) might be her sentimental favorite, West also thinks he has a chance to win “because he’s really smart, a really cool guy and seems to know what he’s doing.” Yet, for other reasons she explained later, “I’m fighting for Cyndi, though.”
On the NBC show that aired April 18, the same night she attended the Academy of Country Music Awards in Las Vegas, West helped the women of Team Tenacity kick ass in a challenge to make over a “young country artist.” Male singer Luke Bryan and team RockSolid were the competitors.
Tenacious project manager (and pop icon) Cyndi Lauper took a personal interest in West, whose performance of “Blue Sky,” which West wrote and recorded with Keith Urban for that upcoming album, proved to be a pivotal, moving moment in the challenge. Even hunky country bruiser Trace Adkins, a former Celebrity Apprentice contestant and 2008 runner-up who returned for this episode as a boardroom adviser, was shown shedding a tear or two.
“I didn’t know if it was allergies up in New York or if he had to sneeze or something,” West joked. “But a lot of people are saying, ‘No, I think you made Trace cry.’ So I ran out to him at the ACMs backstage and I just gave him a big old bear hug and he gave me a huge bear hug back. And he’s just so tender ... you know, he’s like such a bear, but he’s so tender and so sweet. It just really made me feel good. He’s such a real dude. And I think I did maybe make him cry ’cause he’s kind of a softie.”
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