Arnold Schwarzenegger on Taking Over The New Celebrity Apprentice and Global Warming

Arnold Schwarzenegger, the former Terminator movie star and California governor, 69, left politics in 2011. But he’ll become boss of the boardroom January 2 when he takes over as the host of The New Celebrity Apprentice on NBC.

How will you put your own stamp on the show?

A lot of things will stay the same, but I have my own personality—I’m not Donald Trump. He approached it his way, which was very, very effective. This one is a continuation of that, but it will be my personality and sense of humor.

What were you looking for when selecting your advisers?

I wanted people that really had experience. There were a lot of names that were presented to us, but I didn’t feel that they were really strong enough or experienced enough in the business world to be an adviser. That’s why we picked someone that I’ve known for years and someone that was very supportive when I ran for governor, Warren Buffett. He’s an investment guru, of course, and one of the most successful businessmen in the world.

And then Steve Ballmer, who was the former Microsoft CEO and now owns the Los Angeles Clippers. I don’t know if you have watched him when he’s out on the court. He goes crazy. He has this overenergetic pitch and he can really pump up anybody.  No matter how down you are, that guy can pump you up. He just has so much energy. I thought that it would be great to get in touch with him to bring that energy into the boardroom, which he did.

And Tyra Banks. She’s a supermodel, actress, TV host, producer, an accomplished businesswoman and the CEO of Tyra Beauty. When I was talking earlier about our teams competing with makeup, it was the Tyra’s cosmetics line. She has created a line that you can actually make yourself over within a few minutes. That’s what that competition was all about.

Jessica Alba is also a very talented woman and the founder and chief creative officer of the Honest Company and Honest Beauty. Then of course, I thought it’s always good to have someone from the family there that is really smart, like Donald Trump always did. I have Patrick M. Knapp Schwarzenegger, who is my nephew, and who is a very big shot out here in Hollywood, a great entertainment lawyer, one of my most trusted confidants and my lawyer.

Instead of saying “You’re fired,” what will be your catchphrase?

There were so many ideas, from “Hasta la vista, baby” to “You won’t be back” or “Get to the chopper.” So many great lines [from] movies. We worked on all of them.

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Apprentice production moved from New York to the West Coast to accommodate you. Will there be other changes?

It’s all about winning and going for it, handing over the title of Celebrity Apprentice and a $250,000 check to give to the designated charity. That whole idea is the same. But they have very different challenges.

One was taking [the competitors] out to Universal Studio just before the Harry Potter ride was opening. They took the ride. Then they had to kind of come up with an interesting concept to sell the ride. Universal Studios was the judge for that competition.

Another funny one was a makeup challenge, where they had to make up people within a few minutes. We had the women and the men competing against each other. As you can imagine, men don’t really deal with makeup. Of course, someone like Boy George did and there was one other celebrity there that did, but that made it a really funny show to see the women and the men competing about who has the best sales pitch about makeup and looking good. The men did extraordinarily well on that one and were very creative, but it made it a very funny show. 

You were governor of California for two terms. What was the biggest adjustment going back to civilian life?

That wasn’t so much of an adjustment—the adjustment was becoming a public servant after spending your whole life long thinking about yourself. Then I started getting more into “we” thinking and what I could do for people.

What’s next for you? I’m on an environmental crusade, just like 40 years ago I started a fitness crusade. I think we can do the same thing with the environment and be really successful. It just takes a lot of work.

You were very active as governor in renewable energy.

You never really know exactly what you’re most passionate about when you get into it. It kind of just unfolds. What I didn’t know was that I would become so passionate about things like health-care reform or about environmental issues.

What sparked your interest in cleaning up the environment?

When I saw that 250,000 people a year die in America because of pollution-related illnesses, it’s not an argument. It’s not environmental to have this stupid argument all the time about global warming. No one really cares about that. You’ve got to talk about what is happening today. Today what’s happening is that seven million people in the world die because of pollution. We should talk about that, not about what will happen 20 years from now, or 50 years from now with the water rising and those things.

That’s why in communication so much is missed because it always gets bogged down on: Is there global warming and is this a cost for human beings or not?  I wouldn’t even get into that kind of argument. Yeah, you can do this with experts but when it comes to the general public, you’ve got to talk about right now we are killing people. We’re killing more people with pollution than we are with traffic accidents, homicide, suicide and people getting killed in wars. All combined, it’s not even close to the amount of people that are dying because of pollution. That’s alarming and that’s what I’m concerned about and that’s what I want to fix.

Of course, I am also a believer in global warming, and that we have to reduce the threat of global warming. But that’s a much harder thing for people to understand. That’s why I am very adamant that people should talk about what’s happening today with pollution.

I think we have to systematically move forward because that, I think, is really the most important thing right now, to really teach people how to get off fossil fuels and to use what nature gives us for free, which is the sun, the wind, geothermals and use more renewables like that.