Looks like a DNS Issue to me. Try to add intranet.contoso.com to the hosts file as:
intranet.contoso.com 127.0.0.1
If this works then it is definitely a DNS issue, check if the service is running.
Also check if you actually assigned a virtual network card to the box in VMWare.
Update: To add NIC to VM Ware you edit machine settings and add hardware, add a network card as bridged. You can then manage the network card normally inside Windows.