When MTV showed rapper/mogul 50 Cent the Greenpoint, Brooklyn, warehouse they’d found as the location for his business competition show, “50 Cent: The Money and The Power,” he was struck by how it represented the realities of both the show and his life.”I was like, this is perfect, because [looking off] the roof of the warehouse, you got the entire New York City skyline,” he says. “If you look to the left, it’s the projects. If you look to the right, you see the money – our entire business district.”For a man who went from being a drug dealer at age 12 to earning $150 million (legally) in one year, the view from that warehouse became the perfect metaphor for his career, and the right inspiration for the show’s contestants.The 12-episode series, which airs Thursday nights on MTV, is an “Apprentice”-style competition where 14 contestants endure a series of business and skill-related challenges, with the prize being a $100,000 investment in their own business venture.While many aspects of the show are similar to “The Apprentice” – the business orientation, the confrontational dismissal ceremony, a hypercritical sidekick in the form of G-Unit rapper Tony Yayo – 50 Cent (real name: Curtis Jackson) emphasizes the differences.For one, contestants are fighting for the chance to be entrepreneurs, not employees. “That’s my money,” Jackson says about the grand prize. “It would make me a lot easier about picking the winner if it was somebody else’s money.” Then there’s the setting. While “The Apprentice” traditionally had contestants sleep in luxury suites (adding sleeping bags for losers just last season), Jackson has all the contestants sleep on Army cots. “[That was] to allow them to stay conscious of why they’re there,” he says. “If you put them in a mansion, they might start to enjoy just being on the show enough to not even care about winning.”And given that this is an MTV reality show, much of the action has a sensationalist feel.For their first challenge, each team has to travel from Roosevelt Island to the Brooklyn warehouse on foot, while chained together. Fists come very close to flying over the course of the five-mile trek.But it’s all just business to Jackson, who notes that a cutthroat nature is essential for success.”The logical decision in business may not be the morally best decision,” he says. “I got people who work for me in different ventures, and when things financially go wrong, they look at me. But I ain’t got nobody to look at but God. So if I have to make a decision, I have to make a decision.” But smart business also requires sound judgment. In the first episode, a contestant named Precious shows how not to go cutthroat when, in the midst of a half-crazed rant, she screams at an Asian female opponent to “go do my nails, bitch.””When it happens really early in the show, you might be revealing yourself too early,” Jackson says. “You can have that mentality, saying, “I absolutely gotta win,” and if you don’t have a plan B, you gonna need cutthroat. But how much of that you display initially is a reflection of your character, and it’ll make people target you.””50 Cent: The Money and The Power” was inspired by Jackson’s upcoming book, “The 50th Law,” which he co-wrote with “The 48 Laws of Power” author Robert Greene, and which talks about the similarities between finding success on the street and in the boardroom.”The reality show is almost a visual for what the book is,” says Jackson, who releases his next album, “Before I Self-Destruct,” on December 9, and the book sometime in 2009. “I did pretty well [in the street] before having the opportunity to do legitimate business, and I think that’s [the same] business model applied in different ways. I speak Hood, and English. I can speak directly to someone from that environment in a way that they totally get what I’m saying.”And while Jackson looks forward to imparting his lessons on business, he’s also excited for a very different reason. “I can’t wait to see the first episodes, [because] something psychologically goes on [with me],” he says, laughing. “It’s one of my favorite things to do – look at me on TV.”
50 CENT: THE MONEY AND THE POWER
Thursday, 10 p.m., MTV