In May of 2024, Donald Trump issued a cease and desist for a film centered on the relationship between himself and attorney Roy Cohn. Thankfully, that legal action failed. After getting a beautiful dose of New York in Jason Reitman’s “Saturday Night,” stay at the theater and check out Ali Abbasi’s “The Apprentice” and the not-so-beautiful side of New York.
Donald Trump, played by Sebastian Stan, is an aspiring real estate agent trying to impress daddy. While in an exclusive club, he meets Roy Cohn, portrayed by Jeremy Strong. A Faustian deal ensues as Trump takes the reins in his destiny to make New York City the place he has always dreamt it to be — shiny, unforgiving and a winner.
Stan and Strong are brilliant. Stan could easily fall into an impersonation of Trump, along the lines of a Saturday Night Live (SNL) skit instead of a performance for the big screen. He effortlessly avoids this by focusing on the little tics that have made Trump a caricature in plenty of social media videos and memes. With some decent hair and makeup, the audience soon no longer identifies Stan as the Winter Soldier and instead as the guy who looks vaguely reminiscent of a United States president.
Strong, on the other hand, plays Trump’s foil. Cohn begins as a powerful, inhumane attorney. A man who plays by his own rules: “attack, attack, attack; admit nothing, deny everything; and claim victory, never admit defeat.” By the end of the film, Cohn has been outplayed by Trump and becomes a shadow of the man he once was. From power to sad and downtrodden man, Strong gives an entertaining performance, but nothing new. For Strong in the peak of his sadness, one can check out Succession and his Emmy-winning portrayal of Kendall Roy.
Trump and Cohn’s so-called platonic love for one another becomes the core of the film. Cohn supports Trump in his villainous efforts to memorialize himself and Trump throws Cohn on the curb as soon as he finds a new toy to play with.
Supporting Strong and Stan is Maria Bakalova as Ivanka Trump. Unsurprisingly, Bakalova, similar to Stan, receives minimal material, which is perhaps the greatest problem with “The Apprentice.”
The film has a beautiful landscape and character within New York. Yet the camera is always so focused on the characters, that the griminess and beauty of the city are often unseen.
There is a lot of momentum within the film: a camera constantly in motion, terrific cast chemistry and provocative framing, yet it all falls flat. The performances never receive the room to shine as brightly as they could. Instead, the audience is served with the next absurd legal move by Trump. At one point, the audience finally sees a crack in the armor of Trump, but before it is taken any further, the scene slows down and cuts to the next.
“The Apprentice” offers some laughs and shocking revelations from throughout the life of Trump. However, it is nothing that the general audience might not already know. The laughs are nowhere near the highs reached in the day-to-day reporting of politics.
If yearning for a parody of Trump, check out the dozens of SNL skits on him. If wanting the drama of it all, read a book about him. “The Apprentice” does not do much in the way of comedy or drama, but if interested in getting some more Roy out of Strong then definitely check out “The Apprentice” for his performance as Cohn.
