Chicago Sun-Times: Branson hardly exploring Virgin territory

For the life of me -- or at least for the lives of these reality- show job candidates -- I cannot figure out how walking a beam between two hot-air balloons 10,000 feet in the air makes one suited to run a global corporation.

Ditto for climbing a rope ladder well above terra firma in order to have a tea party with the boss atop one of those balloons.

Or agreeing to go over Victoria Falls in a barrel.

Or performing any of the other Outward Bound-on-steroids stunts that Sir Richard Branson drags his contestants through onFox's "The Rebel Billionaire: Branson's Quest for the Best," a **1/2 around-the- world game show that debuts Tuesday night at 7 on WFLD-Channel 32, purporting to help him select the next president of his Virgin empire.

All it says to me is that they're willing to do stupid stuff to be on TV.

This latest effort from the producers of MTV's "The Real World" and "Road Rules" borrows from those two series and about a dozen others, including "The Apprentice," "Fear Factor," "Survivor," "Punk'd," "The Benefactor" and "The Amazing Race."

"Rebel Billionaire" seems to wink at this creative debt, though it concedes the promised title is likely to look good on a business card and signify little else.

Unfortunately, that rehash of concepts makes too much of "Rebel Billionaire" predictable. As stunning as some of its challenges may be, you're never surprised by any of them.

The show has its moments, despite a two-hour premiere that's too long by half. But its success or failure will have more to do with how much viewer fatigue there is within the genre. (The title "Branson's Quest for the Best" doesn't help, either. It sounds like an "American Idol" knockoff to find the next Andy Williams, though that's what the actual "Idol" is threatening to do.)

It is true that Branson made his Virgin a player in transportation, leisure, telecommunications, venture capital and entertainment partly through his high-profile stunts involving long- distance ballooning and speedy boat crossings. But rather than make the show's stunts seem like legitimate challenges for a potential protege, he makes this series seem like little more than another self- promotional exercise.

Three of Branson's 16 contestants come from Chicago -- an educational-video firm boss, a lawyer and a pharmaceutical sales rep - - but that's not to say they're going to remain in the game for long, and not necessarily because Chicagoans have too much sense than to get wrapped up in such foolishness.

With the exception of a contestant Fox identifies only as a Los Angeles woman, all of the 16 have at least some qualifications to run a business. Even the tennis pro is a Yale grad who's president of a real estate management and investment firm. And that immediately sets them apart from the eight people going through challenges (just as silly but not as dangerous or exciting as Branson's) to impress the Rev. Al Sharpton on Spike TV's "I Hate My Job," which makes its sorry **debut at 8 p.m. Tuesday. Yes. That Rev. Al Sharpton.

You've got a guy who shovels manure but wants to be a model, a blackjack dealer who thinks he's a cartoonist, a pool-table installer who fancies himself a stuntman, a Harvard-educated lawyer who wants to be a comedian and so on.

These people are lucky to come off as qualified for the jobs they're trying to quit, let alone the ones they fantasize about. None, however, is as ill-considered as the preschool teacher who's certain he would be a great nightclub promoter. How much sympathy are we supposed to have for a guy who complains that the problem with his current job is that little kids "[defecate], they [urinate], they suck"?

You would think Rev. Al would kick him in the butt before this game even begins. Instead, all he does is posture, grimace and spout advice that sounds like it came from a fortune cookie. Say what you will about Branson, but hot-air balloons are preferable to hot air.