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Sebastian Stan and Jeremy Strong are presenting The Apprentice, a new Donald Trump biographical drama set in the 1970s. Donald Trump seeks independence from his father’s influence and ventures into Manhattan real estate.
Extra’s Terry Seymour spoke to Sebastian and Jeremy, who play Donald Trump and notorious lawyer Roy Cohn, respectively, about the film.
Stan revealed that he spends “about an hour and a half to two hours” in the makeup chair every morning to transform into Trump.
He further added, “We were shooting sporadically, jumping across time zones, so there was a lot of hair and make-up switching…You know, it was always a very anxious process. I mean, we were shooting so easily. We lost people who were involved because the movie started and stopped, but it was about finding the right amount, not too much, not too little, just in the middle. It was kind of a deliberate process of trying to do this. Even if you do this, you don’t know if it’s always going to lead to results or if you’re going to get there in the way you want, but you put in the dedication. If you keep going, you will make it to the end.”
There are some controversial scenes in this movie, but did Sebastian feel comfortable playing the role of Trump despite the mixed opinions?
He said, “When I first read the script in 2019, I think I left it on the doorstep feeling uncomfortable. I put aside my judgment and was as open as possible to what the job required.” And you have to approach your work objectively.”
Stan was even advised by people not to play Trump. He said: “Again, people have very strong opinions about this guy and this situation. There’s obviously a feeling that half the country is going to be alienated, that there’s a security issue or something.” I never thought that America would once again be in such a state of fear that we would not be able to have a conversation. I think it would be a tragedy if we had the ability to encourage people to understand where they can learn from when they have the right to learn from it.”
Jeremy said, “We’ve made a movie about Nixon, we’ve made a movie about George W. Bush, we’ve made a movie about every historical figure you can imagine. Why make a movie about Donald Trump? Is it not okay?”
Sebastian also explained how he was able to portray Trump and Cohn without seeming like an impersonation. He said, “You have to cross out the names and try to look at it with fresh eyes and try to understand it. And we’re looking at all the evidence… Fortunately, there’s a lot of information out there, documents and books written, trying to get it all done in a limited amount of time and then some. make the decision.”
Jeremy shared his two cents and said: “You want to make it as lifelike and three-dimensional as possible. I don’t know how you do it, but that’s certainly what we were both trying to do.”
The film will be released a month before the presidential election, which Jeremy describes as “fortunate” timing.
He elaborated as follows: “This movie has been around for years and only came together last year. Then the release was effectively postponed because no one in Hollywood wanted to touch it. They… was afraid of lawsuits, repercussions, and threats from President Trump.They were able to find a distributor and the film was released in the middle of this historic election. It’s not entirely unintentional.”
Strong felt this was “an important story to be told” about Trump’s early years and “how he became who he is today.”
It’s unclear whether Trump has seen the film, but Jeremy hopes he does.
“The Apprentice” will be released on October 11th.