You're Hired: 7 Reasons Dionne Warwick Will Dominate Celebrity Apprentice

As the greatest female pop vocalist of the last half-century, Dionne Warwick doesn't need to go off and do a season of Celebrity Apprentice to retain her place in the American cultural canon. The American cultural consciousness, however? OK, sure. Cosmically unfair as it is, the woman who made swinging, tearjerking hits of Bacharach/David masterpieces like "Walk on By" and "Anyone Who Had a Heart" has slid to sub-Carnie Wilson depths of recognition -- a criminal oversight worthy of a prime-time, mass-market correction whose time has come, starting with Sunday's season premiere. This will happen.

Here's why:

1. God is on her side.

It would no doubt help to have some business and industry acumen when attempting to win the annual endorsement of one Donald J. Trump. But what Dionne lacks in instinct she makes up for in having made it out of East Orange, N.J. in gospel groups while fellow diva (and Apprentice "competition") LaToya Jackson was still toddling around inside empty toy boxes on Christmas morning. The Lord hath duly noted His child's service, and His boardroom grace shall raineth down on Our Lady of the Vibrato.

2. Karma is on her side.

Dionne isn't exactly what you'd call a winner in life. Sure, she has five Grammys (one of which she shares with Stevie Wonder, Elton John and Gladys Knight for "That's What Friends are For," even though she owned that song -- still does, in fact), but so do the Black Eyed Peas, so... yeah. Much of the rest of Dionne's experience involves scams, mismanagement, divorce, dissolved partnerships, vocal duress, industry bias and other general mishaps on the way to the promised land. I mean, her version of "Alfie" defines the song and went to number 15 on the US charts, but Cilla Black's derivative white-girl soul knockoff went to number 9 in the UK, and Cher's version was used in the movie of the same name. Shoulda been Dionne. Now it will be. It is her time.

3. She is on her side.

All that being said, I love the story one of my friends told me about why he was raised to adore Patti LaBelle and disregard Dionne: As a young child attending a joint concert featuring the two ladies, his mother had a warm encounter with fan-friendly LaBelle and a far chillier interlude with Ms. D. I think her words were, "Get these people away from me." Let's hope it's true, because hateful as that sounds, such iciness will come in awfully handy when dealing with entitled psychobrats like Gary Busey, Meat Loaf and Star Jones.

4. She's unscrupulous -- to a point.

In fairness, it's going to be pretty hard to outperform the villainy of fellow Apprentice star Richard Hatch, who did two years of hard time for evading taxes on money he won by being one of reality TV's most evil people. But for years, Dionne was a notorious tax scofflaw, landing on the California's top 250 offenders list until suddenly... she didn't. As recently as a year ago she owed the state's Franchise Tax Board nearly $2.2 million; today her name appears nowhere on that list. Merely a precondition of her Apprentice appearance, or a sign that Ms. D operates by her own rules, on her own schedule, system be damned? Either way it's not pretty, but it gets the job done.

5. All those Psychic Friends.

Duh! Huge advantage.

6. She has nothing to lose.

NBC is selling the season on Busey/Meat Loaf meltdowns, NeNe/Marlee drama, David Cassidy charm, Lil Jon trainwreckery -- basically anything and everything (and everyone) but our septuagenarian sleeper. The idea of her even having to get out of bed to vanquish such fluff goblins as Mark McGrath or Niki Taylor is sidesplitting; she kicked NeNe's ass in no fewer than three previous lives before Ms. Leakes wised up and got reborn in Atlanta. I can't wait for the rematch.

7. Her victory tour would be awesome.

I'm just being selfish now, but come on. Just one more live version of "Do You Know the Way to San Jose?" and "Heartbreaker," and I can die. You're hired, babe.