Sebastian Stan: “We chose to make Trump almost normal to understand him better”

The Marvel actor looks back on his incarnation of Donald Trump in The Apprentice.

Bucky plays Trump! The Marvel actor plays Donald Jr. before he became the business mogul and politician we know today. The Apprentice indeed traces the rise to power of Trump in the late 70s and 80s under the tutelage of his mentor, the famous lawyer Roy Cohn (geniusly played by Jeremy Strong). By exposing the personalities of the two men, Sebastian StanStrong and director Ali Abbasi are not signing a political film, nor a Hollywood revenge against the Republican dictator. They want to offer a human version of the character so that the public comes away with a better understanding of the former President, but also of themselves: “As an artist, we must explore the human side of people, probe their soul and thus better understand the mechanisms that push us to do this or that thing.”
Interview with a very… relaxed actor.

The Apprentice: a surprising biopic on the rise of Trump [critique]

What was your reaction when you had the script in your hands?

I received it in 2019. A different time, if you think about everything that has happened since then… I knew Ali Abassi, whose work I appreciated, and I immediately thought it would be interesting to to have the point of view of an artist like him – his Iranian origins, his status as a European filmmaker – on such an American story. When I started reading, I decided to cross out the names. I crossed out Donald Trump, crossed out Roy Cohn. My idea was simple: I wanted to discover this script without knowing who it was about. And it was revealing. Thus anonymized, this story reminded me of films like Midnight Cowboy Or The Godfatherand particularly The Godfather II. Because I felt like I was watching a man shed his humanity and turn into a stone statue. It's a film about the American dream, about what it has meant and what it still means. And told by Ali, I felt there was something to dig into.

Have you ever hesitated?

At first I wasn't sure of myself. But when I asked around if I should go, the answers were varied. That’s when I realized it wasn’t all black and white. How complex it was. And so, it was worth a try. But, it was 2019! And I didn't hear from Ali until 2022. In the meantime, a lot had happened. The pandemic, January 6 (2021, date of the assault on the Capitol, editor's note)… In 2022, we tried to launch production of the film. But it took over a year before we could finally shoot The Apprentice. On several occasions, the film was on track and then for one reason or another, everything stopped… And each time, the same question came up: “but why did I get into something like this? »

Were you afraid?

I don't know, but in any case, I couldn't give up out of fear or because I was dreading something… Yes. The Apprentice should not be done, it should not be because of me, because of my apprehensions.

What, deep down, pushed you to play this role? Was there a political motivation?

No. I agreed to play Trump for the same reasons I agreed to play Bucky Barnes or Tommy Lee. What always motivates me is understanding humans. We cannot forget the political dimension of the character, but my role as an artist is to explore humanity in all its forms. The one we have, but also the one we miss or the one we lost. In my eyes, it was the only way to approach this subject and this character.

For what ?

Because it has already been scrutinized from every angle, but never from a human point of view. It's very easy to talk about it as if it were a specific, different entity. But that's wrong. We chose to make it almost normal to understand it better.

You hope to forget the political aspect of the film, but the presidential election is looming. Is it that The Apprentice is not going to be caught up by the calendar?

Everyone will have a different perspective on the film. Some will think that we are not humanizing it, others will see it as a political agenda… We asked ourselves a lot of questions. But let's be clear: it was never strategic. We thought The Apprentice day to day; we finished it at the end of January and five months later we were in Cannes, which was unimaginable…

Do you know if Donald Trump has seen the film?
I don't know anything about it. But I think if that were the case we would know. Ali obviously offered to show him…

How did you get into this role? What were your inspirations? We thought a little about Brett Easton Ellis, particularly for the description of 80s New York and for the vampiric relationship between Cohn and Trump.

BEE had escaped me! But it's an interesting theory. Recently a lot of people have been talking to me about Gordon Gekko in the first Wall Street. It hadn't occurred to me either, but I tell myself now that it's not stupid. In fact, I was inspired by several interviews he gave. Including one from 1978 where he talks about his journey. The journalist asks him at one point what he would do if he had to choose between love or professional success. And he answers… love. Given his career path, it’s really very surprising! From the start, I immersed myself in the archives of the time. I tried to find out as much as possible about the military school, about his father, about the way he was educated. Everything is online and this work allowed me to find the balance between what we see today and what was happening at the time. Look! It's pretty amazing because he was actually a lot more articulate and he communicated a lot better. In the early 80s, he was on the cover of GQ and we learned that he was the first to hire women at Trump Tower! All this is at your fingertips, just one click away, and it gives a more nuanced version of the character.

The ApprenticeofAli Abbasi, with Sebastian Stan, Jeremy Strong, Iona Rose MacKay… Duration 2 hours. Released October 9, 2024.

Cannes 2024: The Apprentice, seen by Sebastian Stan and Ali Abbasi