-- Shares Facebook Twitter Reddit Email When we first meet Donald Trump in the new movie “ The Apprentice ” it is in the early 70s and Trump is in his mid-20s. He is a slumlord collecting rent from poor tenants for his abusive father. Some of them pour water on him.
Some cuss him out. Some avoid him completely. Facing bankruptcy for discriminatory rental policies, young Donald, looking for help, turns to the one man he believes can successfully bully the government – Roy Cohn .
The infamous attorney takes Trump under his wing, teaches him how to dress, act, and above all how to “win." Thus begins an acidic mentorship that ends up giving us the Donald Trump we all know today. “The Apprentice” is a dark comedy and drama that shows us what happens when our darkest desires, tempered by amorality, grim determination, a substandard intellect and greed all converge into a real-life Shakespearian tragedy.
In Ali Abbasi’s movie, as in real life, Trump relies on the mentorship of a lean and mean Falstaff (Cohn as played by the brilliant Jeremy Strong) to guide him through his business dealings in New York. Trump, as played by Sebastian Stan (Bucky Barnes in the Marvel movies) is a dead-ringer for the Trump we all know today. Stan plays Trump as a blank slate.
In the beginning, he is naïve. Cohn quickly schools him up in his limousine about the reality and facts of the case against him and his father about the accusations of racial discrimination in their housing project.