The Apprentice told by Sebastian Stan and its director, Ali Abbasi

The interpreter of Donald Trump and the filmmaker return to the production of this film, the character and the scene of marital rape that has made a lot of talk.

While the film on the young years of the current boss of the White House is broadcast this evening on Canal Plus, back on the origins of this crazy project with this interview carried out during the Cannes Film Festival in 2024.

How is the desire to devote a film to Donald Trump?

Ali Abbasi: I see this story in a certain way as the extension of Border that I had presented here in Cannes, in the a certain look section: an attempt to go and seek humanity in places where it seems completely absent. I know that many people see Donald Trump as a monster. This is not my case and with this film, so I go in search of humanity in him. Not to heroize it or justify anything he could say and do but to show that basically, it is the product of a system pushed to his extreme. This American system and its logic “The Winner Takes It All” which leaves no room for losers. An obsession with success at all costs which causes abuses and collateral cascades, of which Donald Trump therefore represents the symbol. And I believe that my position as a non -American filmmaker gives me the perspective to do so.

How did you build this character with Sebastian Stan?

AA: We experienced something special with this film. A long -term adventure that we started to talk about both more than five years ago before it was struck by the pandemic then by the assault of the Capitol of January 6, 2021 which, even if The Apprentice does not deal with this era, necessarily had an impact on the film. But I remember very well the first direction that I gave to Sebastian and who did not move an iota throughout the process: to embody Donald Trump in this period of his life, it is like swimming in a very shallow swimming pool, where your knees scrape the bottom. Unlike his mentor, Roy Cohn, where the amplitude of things to play, of the raptor which seems unsubstitute to the patient of AIDS having lost all power, Sebastian was not going to be able to benefit from this depth. And therefore deliver a composition where everything must go through an extreme nuance, to bring things to life which, in the scenario, are not necessarily readable. All without pouring into caricature and therefore making a counter-meaning compared to the scenario. It’s a crazy actor’s work!

The Apprentice: Donald Trump’s Origin Story (Critique)

Sebastian, how did you understand it?

Sebastian Stan: This scenario plunged me back in the memory of my first visit to New York with my mother, while I was 12 years old, just before we settle there. For me who was born in Romania, America then represented a kind of promised land, the exact opposite of what we lived under a communist regime. The American Dream in all its splendor. “The country where you have to become someone” repeated my mother to me because nothing seemed impossible. And basically, although American, Trump is not that different from the little Romanian kid I was. Except that he, contrary to what I have been able to do, never questioned the black side of the dream, the cost on such a “walking or burst” side. With him, the notion of good and evil disappears behind the obsession with always earning more. This is what guided me in the composition of his character

A scene from The Apprentice has been particularly commented on since the screening of the film before yesterday, that of the rape committed by Trump on his wife Ivana. How did you staging it?

AA: As I would have done for a cascade with the same consideration for the safety and ease of Sebastian and Maria (Balakova) who were going to turn it. We repeat a lot, each gesture is dissected and validated so that at the time of filming, the actors can focus on what this scene must emotionally get out and nothing. Besides, at that time, I hardly speak. Actors as a technical team, everyone knows what to do. But it turns out that that day, everything was particularly galley. For questions of fitting in particular jewelry that Ivana Trump wore in the previous scene. So I sincerely did not have time to think what Donald Trump and his team were going to think of this scene. It is really before yesterday, during the projection, that all of this suddenly arose in me! Because, obviously by deciding to film it, I take a responsibility and I realize to touch something extremely sensitive. But I do it in conscience. First of all because this scene really took place. Then because it tells something essential of the character. Of his violence. From his thirst for power, of domination that goes through sex here. I did not want to self-censor or add more but stay in an icing realism.

This responsibility to embody a person still alive, how did you understand it, Sebastian?

SS: In the same way as every time I had to confront it in my journey. With despite everything here a particular element. Everyone has an opinion on Trump and everyone is waiting for my interpretation and more broadly the film correspond to what he has in mind. My job is therefore to ignore it, to chase it from my mind to build the Trump as the scenario tells

This film is also a duo. That of Trump and his mentor Roy Cohn which he will gradually devour, therefore of Sebastian Stan with Jeremy Strong…

AA: I am really sad that Jeremy could not be present with us in Cannes to see and hear the enthusiasm how deserved around his performance. Unlike Sebastian, he went on board the project very late. Which makes what it does even more impressive. But what struck me was what happened between him and Sebastian on the set. Their complicity while their working methods are in contrast and above all their ability to surprise each other permanently. It took each scene even further where they face each other.

The Apprentice. Ali Abassi. With Sebastian Stan, Jeremy Strong, Iona Rose Mackay. Duration: 2h