Joan Rivers Wins NBC's 'Celebrity Apprentice'

Comedian, stage actress and beloved TV personality Joan Rivers was declared the winner of "The Celebrity Apprentice" in New York on last night's finale episode. Rivers "aced" out world champion poker player Annie Duke Sunday night in the celebrity packed business-themed reality show's 3-hour finale.

The finalists' last challenge had them reunite with various "Apprentice" castoffs to organize separate auctions for their favorite charities. "Apprentice" star and executive producer Donald Trump noted the competition was about more than who raised the most money, it was about how the women played the game.

"Your level of strength, your level of energy have just been amazing," Trump told Rivers. "You really are a role model for so many people... Annie, you're fired. Joan, congratulations."

Rivers, her daughter Melissa, Herschel Walker and Clint Black raised $150,830 for God's Love We Deliver in the final challenge on the emotional episode.

Born and raised in Brooklyn, Joan Rivers "made the rounds" in New York during the '50s, appearing in a few off-off Broadway plays (including one where she played a lesbian opposite an equally unknown Barbra Streisand), surviving sleazy agents, tawdry clubs, and hostile audiences. A 1965 booking on "The Tonight Show with Johnny Carson" led to her hosting one of the first syndicated talk shows on daytime TV, "That Show with Joan Rivers" in 1968.

In the '70s Joan wrote the TV-movie The Girl Most Likely To (starring Stockard Channing) and then wrote and directed her first feature film Rabbit Test, casting Billy Crystal in the lead. In 1983 Joan became the permanent guest host on "The Tonight Show." Later, she headlined in Las Vegas, sold out Carnegie Hall, produced a Grammy nominated comedy album, and wrote two best-selling books. In 1989 the Tribune Corporation launched Joan in her own syndicated daytime talk show. She won an Emmy and a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame. In 1994 she wrote and starred on Broadway in Sally Marr and Her Escorts, for which she received a Best Actress Tony nomination. Since then, Joan has written three more best-selling books, maintains her own jewelry line on QVC, provided fashion commentaries for E! and The TV Guide Channel, and filmed a special for Bravo.

Later this year, she will also host the new reality TV series How'd You Get So Rich? on TV Land.

 

Photo Credit: Walter McBride/Retna Ltd.

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