The latest candidate to be fired from The Apprentice has said he will now pursue an acting career to prove Baroness Karren Brady wrong about him.
Kurran Pooni received the boot from Lord Alan Sugar after losing out in an advertising task, in which he lead a disastrous pitch for a budget airline.
However, the law graduate, 22, is adamant he will go on to do “something epic”.
Pooni told the Press Association: “I think he (Lord Sugar) sees potential in me to go on and do great things, I really do.”
Asked why the business mogul did not keep him in the competition, Pooni replied: “Those great things might not necessarily involve him.”
He added: “I get this game. I understand he had to fire me and that is why I winked at him before I went because it’s OK, just make it quick and painless.
“Let’s go, I’ve had my fun here and I’m out, it’s done for me.
“You need to understand it is a TV show and an entertainment show and he had kept me in for this long and now it’s my time to go and I’m OK with that.”
Pooni added he was determined to prove Baroness Brady wrong after she criticised his acting abilities in the comic book task in the second week of the show.
He said: “My next step is to prove to everybody that I can act. I have actually got on tape Karren saying at the end of my comic task that it’s quite clear I can’t act, so my life goal is to prove her wrong and when I win my first Oscar I will play that tape.
“I can act, and if for the sake of the show we are going to have this actor who can’t act and can’t pitch, I am cool with that, but outside of the show I control what I do, I control what roles I take in theatre, TV series or film and those will be epic.
“So the next goal is to seek representation by an acting agent, hopefully get on the books of someone really good. I don’t think there will be anyone on their books who can offer what I can offer, I really don’t, and hopefully if they believe in the vision that I have we can go on and do great things.
“I think the way I look, I speak, I behave and I interact, is quite rare and I think that my acting prowess is good enough to get me on the cast of a good production.”
Pooni said the amount of money up for investment for the winning apprentice has affected the show.
He added: “Over the years the show has had to adapt. Ten years ago £250,000 was a lot of money, today it doesn’t go as far as it did 10 years ago, so I think that the show now is just as much about allowing audiences to escape and have a laugh and make fun out of the candidates as it is to seek investment.”
However, he said he stands by the advert he created for his team’s JetPop airline, which was derided by experts, saying: “With adverts and anything that is creative, be it art, music, people form varied opinions and you can have one guy here looking at something and saying ‘wow that is amazing’ and another dude saying completely the opposite.
“So on this occasion Lord Sugar didn’t like the advert but I could find a room full of people that do.
“I stand by that advert, I really do, and I mean that.
“It’s my baby, that’s my passion project right there.”