#martin donovan stan

[martin-donovan]

Simple Men (1992) dir. Hal Hartley

[mrs-stans]

SEBASTIAN STAN & MARTIN DONOVAN attends the "The Apprentice" Red Carpet at the 77th annual Cannes Film Festival

[brynnterpretations]

WHAT MUSIC THE LOSERS CLUB LISTENS TO ☻

Ben Hanscom

Ben loves sentimental ‘80s pop and boy bands, with his favorite artists being New Edition, New Kids on the Block, and The Jets. It sounds good, is catchy, and most of all, resonates with Ben — say what you want about that sort of music, but the tracks are undeniably well-written (even if corny in today’s standards), and Ben loves it for the artistry and sound. Plus, the singers always look really cool.

Beverly Marsh

Bev loves female-fronted classic rock, with her favorite artists being Blondie, Joan Jett & the Blackhearts, and The Runaways. After her mother passed of breast cancer when Bev was three, the only music record she’d left behind was The Runaways’ self-titled debut album, and she listened to  it religiously. Because of that, she developed a taste for rock and alternative music led by women, and her room is chock-full of Stevie Nicks posters. 

Bill Denbrough

Bill loves folk and psychedelia, with his favorite artists being Donovan, Jefferson Airplane, and Harry Nilsson. Bill likes music that he can appreciate the lyrics of yet still “turn off his brain to”, and especially enjoys ones that are intertwined with nature (whether it’s the songwriting or the “feel” of the song). 

Eddie Kaspbrak

Eddie loves ‘60s doo-wop, with his favorite artists being . Eddie. Because he’s so sheltered that even the radio is off limits to him, Eddie grew up on older music, but he likes it — it reminds him of Coca-Cola, summer bike rides with the rest of the Losers, and sunny days. Admittedly, Eddie also is a big fan of ‘60s girl bands like The Shirelles, but he tries to hide it due to Richie being an ass. 

Mike Hanlon 

Mike loves classic rock with blues influences, with his favorite artists being Howlin’ Wolf, John Lee Hooker, and Muddy Waters. Mike was raised on the 20th-century blues powerhouses by his family — AKA Charley Patton, Robert Johnson, and Son House — and his music taste reflects that. He is a huge music guy, and takes special care of all his vinyls. 

Richie Tozier

Richie loves funky, upbeat new wave, with his favorite artists being DEVO, Oingo Boingo, and Walls of Flesh. Basically, he likes fun, textured music that stimulates his thirteen-year-old brain, with interesting lyrics that range from humorous to absolutely nonsensical. In contrast to Mike, while Richie loves music, he does not take care of his equipment, and has fried his Sony CD player from the sheer force he used to blast “Dead Man’s Party” through it. 

Stan Uris

Stan loves “big band” and swing music, with his favorite artists being Dean Martin, Frank Sinatra, and Louis Armstrong. Stan-the-Man, ever prim and proper, has always been attracted to more sophisticated music, but still likes the fun, jazzy stuff that his favorite musicians offer — see “You Make Me Feel So Young” by Frank Sinatra, one of his all-time favorites.

[steelbluehome]

"The two leads are fantastic: Stan navigates from naïve wannabe to glowering mogul and never loses his way or slips into parody. His vanity about his hair and his looks is on display from the beginning, but in the early years he is unsure of himself and there is a vulnerability about him. Strong is also utterly believable as Cohn, a man as vain as his disciple and certainly as dangerous."

The Standard

The Apprentice review: Sebastian Stan shines in drama about how Donald Trump went from wannabe to mogul (click for article)

This origin story does an excellent job of showing the rise and rise of Donald Trump

Jo-Ann Titmarsh

4 out of 5 stars

One of the hottest tickets in Cannes this year is Iranian director Ali Abbasi’s The Apprentice, his tale of the rise and rise of Donald Trump.

The apprentice in question is Trump himself (Sebastian Stan), while the master he serves and later usurps is Roy Cohn (Jeremy Strong), a lawyer who hobnobs with leaders and has the ear of the president.

Cohn is ruthless and will stop at nothing to attain what he wants, often in the name of a patriotism which equals hard-right conservatism.

The film opens in 1970s New York. Donald is a baby-faced teetotal rent collector for his dad, but he yearns to break free of his father’s grip and strive for greater things, obsessing over the tycoons and millionaires that frequent Le Club.

This is where he meets Cohn who takes Trump under his wing and instructs him to follow his three essential tenets, which are all about achieving, denial and how even a defeat can be turned into a win.

Abbasi deftly recreates the feel of the city and the darkness of those years. And what starts gritty becomes colourful once Ivana (Maria Bakalova) appears her platinum blonde hair, scarlet dress and matching glossy lips.

The other important people are his family members. Martin Donovan plays Fred, the abusive and monstrous family patriarch. Donald’s mother Mary (Iona Rose MacKay) is a less forceful presence, while Trump’s brother Freddy (Charlie Carrick) is sympathetically depicted as a man slowly but irrevocably broken by his father’s contempt.

As the film moves into the 1980s, the look changes completely as the Eighties vibe comes clearly into focus, like walking into the neon-lit bathroom of a dingy club.

There is nothing but tackiness here, that harsh lighting revealing the deals in Atlantic City, the over-the-top décor of the Trump home and the gaudiness of the couple’s life together, even as their relationship falls apart.

The harshness also highlights Trump’s ascension as Cohn begins to falter and the apprentice becomes the master.

The film ends with Trump drafting his book The Art of the Deal, in which he dictates those three tenets drummed into him by Cohn. Nothing about Trump is original. Nothing has been gained by him alone. And there is nothing he won’t do to get what he wants.

The two leads are fantastic: Stan navigates from naïve wannabe to glowering mogul and never loses his way or slips into parody. His vanity about his hair and his looks is on display from the beginning, but in the early years he is unsure of himself and there is a vulnerability about him. Strong is also utterly believable as Cohn, a man as vain as his disciple and certainly as dangerous.

It’s hard not to bring up comparisons with Succession here: a New York dynasty, a tyrannical father, the wealthy elite, the presence of Jeremy Strong who played Kendall Roy… there’s even a fleeting glimpse and mention of Rupert Murdoch, whom Cohn says Trump should cosy up to. And then there’s the excellent music by Martin Dirkov, which has echoes of the Succession theme.

There are some problems, the story is too linear and the screenplay, by Gabriel Sherman, full of scenes seen many times before, such as Cohn chasing after Trump in the street begging for an audience or Donald refusing his calls, and the director could have been more inventive in the fil. However, there is a lot of humour here, particularly thanks to the character of Cohn, and almost always at Trump’s expense.

The Apprentice is not going to change anyone’s mind about Trump, who is so vain that he will almost certainly love this film, despite the references to his plastic surgery and big butt.

But Abbasi does an excellent job of showing us how and why Trump became the Trump of today and how his path to presidency was paved.

[travllingbunny]

So, The Apprentice, directed by Ali Abbasi and starring Sebastian Stan, Jeremy Strong, Maria Bakalova and Martin Donovan, had its world premiere on Monday at the Cannes festival. I have tried to avoid reading too many of the reviews, because most of them are written by people who seem to think they should be describing specific scenes (how do you write a spoiler-filled review for a movie based on real life? That's how), but I have still read several reviews in full and quotes from many others that have been plastered across social media, and seen reactions on Twitter.

And at this point I just have to address how terrible many of these reviews are.No, I don't mean in the sense that they are negative about the movie, I mean that they are terribly written and contain insane, stupid arguments. I will not be able to see the film until it is released worldwide (probably in the autumn), so I can't talk about the film itself and its quality, but some of the arguments are bad by themselves. It's not surprising that, due to the topic of the movie (you know), many are unable to be normal about it even when writing professional reviews. But can you write reviews that don't use arguments like.. (and here am I'm going to list increasingly bad, stupid arguments, with the dumbest and most insane one at the end (including a quote from a review that exudes homophobia and antisemitism))

"Why is this movie made, why now, do we really need it?" (We don't need any movie. No movie is a necessity. And maybe your review shouldn't be about you being pissed off to begin with that there's a movie about Trump, even if it's highly critical and unflattering.)

"We already know all this" (What else did you expect?! That's true of any movie or other fictional work based on real life events and people. Every such movie only tells events you already know if you have done a minimum of research on the topic -information is available online for everyone to see. .Unless you go and just make up things. Should a film based on real events include made up stuff to be better?? Not that the general audiences tend to know all about the real life topics of various biopics and real life fictional work, they usually don't because people don't read up on everything. )

-"Since these things are already known, it's unlikely that it could be a game changer in the elections" - Of course it won't. Who in the right mind ever expects a movie to change minds (people who don't like what's shown will just say it's lies and propaganda, which the Trump campaign is already saying) and affect elections?! What made you think that's what it's meant to do, or what movies generally do.

Anything along the lines of "Trump would hate/love seeing..." Why are you trying to read his mind? Especially weird when you see negative reviews based on the idea "Trump would actually love this because [reasons]" (especially wild knowing some of the extremely unflattering things shown in the movie, but these comments usually contain weird projections to the effect that he will think he looks cool because he 'wins' in the end? Which may say a lot about the people saying these things) Meanwhile, the Trump campaign is threatening to sue the movie

"The movie is tepid, doesn't go far enough... " (OK, in what way...?) "in making Trump look bad enough. it's so dangerous to humanize him" (?!) I guess the better approach would be to portray him as an alien monster from outer space who was born evil. This is obviously stupid in itself, but even wilder when you know it's about a movie where (SPOILER)................................ ....................................he is shown raping his wife............................................................................................. What does it say about you if you think this is still not unflattering enough? (Then again, Trump is not the only POTUS who has had multiple allegations of rape, sexual assault and sexual harrassment against him, in fact that's true of 3 of the 5 last Presidents of the USA including the curent one, so it's more of a feature than a bug in US politics...)

and then similar to this, but even wilder, is the absolute worst argument/criticism I've seen (and it says a lot that this is these are the only negative criticisms of the two central performances that I've seen): the performances are weak because those figures are are not caricatured enough?!

This last argument is something I've seen in only two reviews, but it's so bad that I just have to single it out.

One such is The Telegraph review, which argues that Stan's approach is "too sensitive" and that the role needed an actor who is "more of a caricaturist"?!

I thought this was the worst review I've seen, but it gets even worse in this review from something called Little White Lies (I'm linking the Tumblr repost, because I'm not giving this crap a click):

WTF?! Aside from why you would expect the performance to be campy (I know why...) apparently this dude thinks it's a failing that Jeremy Strong is giving a credible and realistic portrayal of Roy Cohn rather than making him look like a homophobic, antisemitic stereotype?! (I don't know if this dude's description of this other performance is accurate, but I'm going by what is said here.) Which this guy thinks is just the right way to go - obviously he believes (like quite a few liberals seem to) that it's OK and in fact desirable to be bigoted when it's against people who are/were bad, right wing and bigoted themselves. See, Roy Cohn was gay and Jewish and he hated being gay (true) and hated being Jewish (debatable), so it's not only perfectly OK but in fact awesome to be homophobic and antisemitic towards him? Oh but see it's fine because he was a hypocrite? Well, I have news for you - so are you. F**k off.

[fostertheory]

Sebastian Stan as DJT

I'm fascinated by the fact that Sebastian Stan is portraying Donald Trump in an upcoming movie.

[chambergambit]

sebastian stan is gonna play trump in a biopic???

"The Apprentice is an upcoming biographical film directed by Ali Abbasi and written by Gabriel Sherman. Starring Sebastian Stan as Donald Trump, the film examines Trump's career as a real estate businessman in New York in the 1970s and 80s. The film also stars Jeremy Strong, Maria Bakalova and Martin Donovan."

[mountaintownfolks]

𝑴𝑼𝑺𝑬𝑳𝑰𝑺𝑻 𝑩𝑹𝑬𝑨𝑲𝑫𝑶𝑾𝑵

𝐬𝐭𝐚𝐧’𝐬 𝐠𝐚𝐧𝐠

➷ eric cartman

➷ kenny mccormick

➷ kyle broflovski

➷ marjorine stotch

➷ stan marsh

𝐜𝐫𝐚𝐢𝐠 𝐚𝐧𝐝 𝐭𝐡𝐨𝐬𝐞 𝐠𝐮𝐲𝐬

➷ clyde donovan

➷ craig tucker

➷ jimmy valmer

➷ tolkien black

➷ tweek tweak

𝐩𝐥𝐞𝐚𝐬𝐞𝐬 𝐚𝐧𝐝 𝐬𝐩𝐚𝐫𝐤𝐥𝐞𝐬

➷ annie knitts

➷ bebe stevens

➷ esther

➷ heidi turner

➷ jenny simons

➷ lizzy

➷ lola

➷ millie larsen

➷ nichole daniels

➷ red mcarthur

➷ wendy testaburger

𝐧𝐨𝐧 𝐜𝐨𝐧𝐟𝐨𝐫𝐦𝐢𝐬𝐭𝐬

➷ firkle smith

➷ henrietta biggle

➷ michael

➷ pete thelman

𝐯𝐚𝐦𝐩𝐢𝐫𝐞 𝐬𝐨𝐜𝐢𝐞𝐭𝐲

➷ allison mertz

➷ annie bartlett

➷ count ravyncrowe

➷ katie gelson

➷ mike makowski

𝐞𝐦𝐨𝐬

➷ sarah collins

𝐟𝐨𝐫𝐞𝐢𝐠𝐧 𝐜𝐫𝐞𝐰

➷ charlotte

➷ damien thorn

➷ estella havisham

➷ pip pirrup

𝐫𝐚𝐢𝐬𝐢𝐧𝐬

➷ ferrari

➷ lexus martin

➷ mercedes

➷ porsche

𝐤𝐢𝐧𝐝𝐞𝐫𝐬

➷ crystal white

➷ filmore anderson

➷ flora larsen

➷ ike broflovski

➷ jenny

➷ quaid

➷ sally bands

𝐟𝐢𝐫𝐬𝐭 — 𝐭𝐡𝐢𝐫𝐝 𝐠𝐫𝐚𝐝𝐞𝐫𝐬

➷ dolly o’connell

➷ karen mccormick

➷ sarah peterson

➷ tricia tucker

𝐨𝐭𝐡𝐞𝐫 𝐟𝐨𝐮𝐫𝐭𝐡𝐢𝐞𝐬

➷ bradley biggle

➷ bradley ( cartman sucks )

➷ jessica rodriguez

➷ josh myers

➷ kelly-ann barlow

➷ kelly pinkerton-tinfurter

➷ loogie

➷ mark cotswolds

➷ rebecca cotswolds

➷ terrance mephesto

➷ thad jarvis

𝐟𝐢𝐟𝐭𝐡 — 𝐧𝐢𝐧𝐭𝐡 𝐠𝐫𝐚𝐝𝐞𝐫𝐬

➷ alexandra cartman

➷ emmett byers ( sixth grade leader )

➷ jenny harrison

➷ kevin mccormick

➷ romper stomper

➷ scott tenorman

➷ shelly marsh

➷ tammy warner

𝐚𝐝𝐮𝐥𝐭𝐬

➷ randy marsh

➷ sharon marsh

➷ liane cartman

➷ carol mccormick

➷ laura tucker

➷ towelie

𝐜𝐚𝐧𝐨𝐧 𝐛𝐚𝐬𝐞𝐝

➷ betty singer ( girl with brown coat | tmi )

➷ delilah katz ( unnamed kinder vamp | goth kids 3: dawn of the posers )

➷ nia torrez ( girl in cat costume | the scoots )

➷ tiffany larsen ( runaway teen girl | clubhouses )

➷ ziggy harlow ( unnamed goth kid | goobacks )

𝐨𝐫𝐢𝐠𝐢𝐧𝐚𝐥 𝐜𝐡𝐚𝐫𝐚𝐜𝐭𝐞𝐫𝐬

➷ brandi barnes ( fourth grader )

➷ chloe yates ( fifth grader )

➷ cooper barnes ( adult )

[lemagcinema]

#Cannes2024 - The Apprentice

Un film d’Ali AbbasiAvec: Sebastian Stan, Jeremy Strong, Maria Bakalova, Emily Mitchell, Martin Donovan, Patch Darragh, Stuart Hughes, Eoin Duffy, Chloe MadisonCe film retrace l’ascension du jeune Donald Trump vers le pouvoir grâce à un accord faustien avec l’influent avocat de droite et arrangeur politique Roy Cohn.Notre avis: **

Retrouvez l'article complet ici https://lemagcinema.fr/festivals/cannes/cannes-2024/cannes2024-the-apprentice/

[martin-donovan]

Book of Life (1999) dir. Hal hartley

[mrs-stans]

SEBASTIAN STAN, MARIA BAKALOVA, MARTIN DONOVAN, CATHERINE MCNALLY & ALI ABBASI (X)

[bitsmag]

Conifer os indicados e vencedores do Critic's Choice categoria TV

Melhor Seriado - DramaAndor (Disney+)Bad Sisters (Apple TV+)Better Call Saul (AMC)The Crown (Netflix)Euphoria (HBO)The Good Fight (Paramount+)House of the Dragon (HBO)Severance (Apple TV+)Yellowstone (Paramount Network) Melhor Ator Seriado - DramaJeff Bridges, The Old ManSterling K. Brown, This Is UsDiego Luna, AndorBob Odenkirk, Better Call SaulAdam Scott, SeveranceAntony Starr, The Boys Melhor Atriz Seriado - DramaChristine Baranski, The Good FightSharon Horgan, Bad SistersLaura Linney, OzarkMandy Moore, This Is UsKelly Reilly, YellowstoneZendaya, Euphoria Melhor Ator Coadjuvante - Seriado DramaAndre Braugher, The Good FightIsmael Cruz Córdova, The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of PowerMichael Emerson, EvilGiancarlo Esposito, Better Call SaulJohn Lithgow, The Old ManMatt Smith, House of the Dragon Melhor Atriz Coadjuvante - Seriado DramaMilly Alcock, House of the DragonCarol Burnett, Better Call SaulJennifer Coolidge, The White LotusJulia Garner, OzarkAudra McDonald, The Good FightRhea Seehorn, Better Call Saul Melhor Seriado de ComédiaAbbott Elementary (ABC)Barry (HBO)The Bear (FX)Better Things (FX)Ghosts (CBS)Hacks (HBO Max)Reboot (Hulu)Reservation Dogs (FX) Melhor Ator - Seriado de ComédiaMatt Berry, What We Do in the ShadowsBill Hader, BarryKeegan-Michael Key, RebootSteve Martin, Only Murders in the BuildingJeremy Allen White, The BearD’Pharaoh Woon-A-Tai, Reservation Dogs Melhor Atriz de ComédiaChristina Applegate, Dead to MeQuinta Brunson, Abbott ElementaryKaley Cuoco, The Flight AttendantRenée Elise Goldsberry, Girls5evaDevery Jacobs, Reservation DogsJean Smart, Hacks Melhor Ator Coadjuvante - Seriado de ComédiaBrandon Scott Jones, GhostsLeslie Jordan, Call Me KatJames Marsden, Dead to MeChris Perfetti, Abbott ElementaryTyler James Williams, Abbott ElementaryHenry Winkler, Barry Melhor Atriz Coadjuvante - Seriado de ComédiaPaulina Alexis, Reservation DogsAyo Edebiri, The BearMarcia Gay Harden, UncoupledJanelle James, Abbott ElementaryAnnie Potts, Young SheldonSheryl Lee Ralph, Abbott Elementary Melhor MinissérieThe Dropout (Hulu)Gaslit (Starz)The Girl from Plainville (Hulu)The Offer (Paramount+)Pam & Tommy (Hulu)Station Eleven (HBO Max)This Is Going to Hurt (AMC+)Under the Banner of Heaven (FX) Melhor Filme - TVFresh (Hulu)Prey (Hulu)Ray Donovan: The Movie (Showtime)The Survivor (HBO)Three Months (Paramount+)Weird: The Al Yankovic Story (The Roku Channel) Melhor Ator - Minissérie ou filme para TVBen Foster, The SurvivorAndrew Garfield, Under the Banner of HeavenSamuel L. Jackson, The Last Days of Ptolemy GreyDaniel Radcliffe, Weird: The Al Yankovic StorySebastian Stan, Pam & TommyBen Whishaw, This Is Going to Hurt Melhor Atriz - Minissérie ou filme para TV Julia Garner, Inventing AnnaLily James, Pam & TommyAmber Midthunder, PreyJulia Roberts, GaslitMichelle Pfeiffer, The First LadyAmanda Seyfried, The Dropout Melhor Ator Coadjuvante - Minissérie ou filme para TVMurray Bartlett, Welcome to ChippendalesDomhnall Gleeson, The PatientMatthew Goode, The OfferPaul Walter Hauser, Black BirdRay Liotta, Black BirdShea Whigham, Gaslit Melhor Atriz Coadjuvante - Minissérie ou filme para TVClaire Danes, Fleishman Is In TroubleDominique Fishback, The Last Days of Ptolemy GreyBetty Gilpin, GaslitMelanie Lynskey, CandyNiecy Nash-Betts, Dahmer – Monster: The Jeffrey Dahmer StoryJuno Temple, The Offer Melhor Seriado de Língua Não Inglesa1899 (Netflix)Borgen (Netflix)Extraordinary Attorney Woo (Netflix)Garcia! (HBO Max)The Kingdom Exodus (MUBI)Kleo (Netflix)My Brilliant Friend (HBO)Pachinko (Apple TV+)Tehran (Apple TV+) Melhor Seriado de AnimaçãoBluey (Disney+)Bob’s Burgers (Fox)Genndy Tartakovsky’s Primal (Adult Swim)Harley Quinn (HBO Max)Star Trek: Lower Decks (Paramount+)Undone (Prime Video) Melhor Programa Talk ShowThe Amber Ruffin Show (Peacock)Full Frontal with Samantha Bee (TBS)The Kelly Clarkson Show (NBC)Last Week Tonight with John Oliver (HBO)Late Night with Seth Meyers (NBC)Watch What Happens Live with Andy Cohen (Bravo) Melhor Especial de ComédiaFortune Feimster: Good Fortune (Netflix)Jerrod Carmichael: Rothaniel (HBO)Joel Kim Booster: Psychosexual (Netflix)Nikki Glaser: Good Clean Filth (HBO)Norm Macdonald: Nothing Special (Netflix)Would It Kill You to Laugh? Starring Kate Berlant & John Early (Peacock) Read the full article

[steelbluehome]

"For the first hour of the film, Stan’s Trump is, deliberately, not the man we know today: his voice has a slight Queens bray, but he avoids all the caricaturist’s tics, murmurs softly and almost tenderly at times, even when describing his ambitious. Stan plays him as he’s written, nervous and unformed and frankly sympathetic"

Little White Lies (click for article)

Mark Asch

The Apprentice – first-look review

Ali Abbasi's attempted takedown of America's previous (and perhaps next) President of the United States, charting his early years under the mentorship of Roy Cohn, lacks the killer instinct.

Did you know Donald Trump is in Paris Is Burning? No, really: in Jennie Livingston’s seismic documentary on New York’s queer ballroom scene, an independent film about people at the margins, there’s an insert shot of a Forbes magazine cover: “What I Learned in the 80s” is the cover feature, and right underneath it, back row center in an illustration of various one-percenters luminaries, there he is, in between check-ins with Willi Ninja and Venus Xtravaganza.

When Trump was elected President of the United States in 2016, so much of American culture became retrospectively seeded with Easter eggs foreshadowing his eventual ascent to the seat of power; future generations, unlike mine, will have no trouble imagining how this could possibly have happened. For so long Trump was present within discourses on business, crime, race, and politics; he was in Home Alone 2 and had a show on NBC; he was a late-night talk-show punchline and appeared at Wrestlemania. He was so ubiquitous, for so long — how could he not have become President?

The point I want to make here is that there is very little we don’t know about Donald Trump; his rise to the White House was accompanied and indeed fueled by wall-to-wall coverage across all forms of media, which during his (first) term as President enjoyed a boom in readership and revenues — there was always another article breaking another new scandal, or unearthing another embarrassing episode from his past that had been hiding in plain sight all along.

It is, then, very difficult to make a movie that has something new to say about Donald Trump, that tells a new story or shows a new side of the most famous person — probably — you’re not supposed to say this — but they’re saying — many people are saying — he’s the most famous person, frankly, that we’ve ever seen, and we’re seeing him more and more. The task before The Apprentice — a biopic telling the story of Trump’s rise in the New York real estate world in the 70s and 80s, abetted by the notorious fixer Roy Cohn — is therefore a formidable one, and it’s not a task to which director Ali Abbasi and screenwriter Gabriel Sherman prove remotely equal.

The film begins in New York City, in the 70s, at an exclusive members’ club where Trump (Sebastian Stan), the twentysomething son of outerboro slumlord Fred (an unrecognizable Martin Donovan), restlessly narrates the power players in the room to his bored date; Trump is an outsider, a striver, palpably uncomfortable — but there, through a doorway, doing the Kubrick Stare, is Roy Cohn, former Joe McCarthy aide during the the Red Scare of the 1950s and infamous lawyer for mobsters and other power players, publicly revealed after his death from AIDS to be a closeted gay man. Cohn takes an interest in Trump, and smooths the wheels for his first big deal, the overhaul of the old Commodore on Manhattan’s then-decrepit 42nd Street.

Trump’s relationship with Cohn was widely reported on during his presidency, so much so that Cohn — a figure notorious enough to have been played by James Woods in a TV movie in the 1990s, and Al Pacino in the HBO miniseries of the Pulitzer-winning Angels in America — has been retconned as primarily Trump’s mentor; a feature-length documentary about him is titled Where’s My Roy Cohn?, after an Oval Office lament. So it’s not exactly newsworthy that the film credits Cohn with teaching Trump to affect a brashness and flair and to learn to attack, deny, and dominate the narrative — nor are these particular novel insights into Trump.

For the first hour of the film, Stan’s Trump is, deliberately, not the man we know today: his voice has a slight Queens bray, but he avoids all the caricaturist’s tics, murmurs softly and almost tenderly at times, even when describing his ambitious. Stan plays him as he’s written, nervous and unformed and frankly sympathetic, genuinely drawn to Ivana (Maria Bakalova) for her ambitions, a finicky and unschooled naïf wandering around Cohn’s decadent parties avoiding the drugs and gay sex. He’s a would-be shark so doughy and vague as to be almost sympathetic, like the budding young Nazi collaborator of Louis Malle’s Lacombe, Lucien.

The almost sympathetic cast of the film’s first hour is, I suppose, a fresh perspective, but equally an offensive and shallow one, driven less by any particular insight into the perverse incentives of American society — the film is remarkably insular, shot largely on soundstage recreations of the Trump home in Jamaica Estates, the penthouse in Trump Tower, the backs of various limos and the offices of various power brokers — than by the dictates of a character arc in which Cohn and Fred are obviously posited as polar opposite father figures, demanding and competitive men after whom Donald models himself and whose approval he seeks.

A number of things change at the film’s halfway mark. The film switches from a celluloid to a digital look — throughout, Abassi and cinematographer Kasper Tuxen ape the period of the action, from seamy red-tinted narrow-gauge for the gritty 70s to a bleary pixelated look that improves throughout the 80s—a gesture that would give the film an appealing momentum and raw texture were the narrative not so wedded to the historical record, with cutesy cameos from Warhol and Rupert Murdoch, and knowing references to the Trump Tower elevators, MAGA, and other future features of American life. Stock-footage montages exposit the eras’ historical context via potted histories of New York City, with an unclear point of view on the cycle of urban decline and rebirth in the postwar era: though lightly in quotation marks, they also seem objective accounts of a general historical record that gives credence to the narrative of White Flight–era NYC as “Fear City” (an image of lawlessness Trump long exploited, first as a developer and then as a demagogue), and of the go-go Reagan 80s, the decade in which Trump applied all of what he learned in the 70s, and of which he became an avatar.

At this point in the film, Stan’s dialogue takes on the familiar turns of phrase, the verbal and physical mannerisms: the diet pill— the pursed lips, the overenunciation and theatrical hand gestures, the addled mile-a-minute grandiose rants and flippant dismissals and breathtaking glibness and oddly matronly cattiness. It’s funny, but hardly virgin territory the years we’ve spent enjoying the work of comedians like James Austin Johnson and that one friend of yours who sends you voice memos in the Trump voice talking about the discourses of the day, impersonators who reshape the news by pushing the man’s implicit grotesquery and absurdity to the fore.

This Trump gets more flagrantly cruel to Ivana, delusional, thin-skinned and aggressive. It’s the kind of charismatic antihero’s journey that might fly in a Scorsese film — arguably the ultimate Trump film is The Wolf of Wall Street — but Abassi and Sherman’s take on the material is largely dutiful. The soundtrack aspires to an incongruously feel-good high-energy looseness that the film doesn’t back up. I’ve never been unhappier to hear Suicide, Pet Shop Boys or New Order, and the smash cut and needle drop that takes us out of after Trump’s rape of Ivana (a scene from her divorce deposition, staged as literally and luridly as you’d expect from the director of Holy Spider) is especially egregious.

Maybe there’s supposed to be a larger point about Trump’s political movement in the way that he’s shown to abandon Cohn as his former mentor’s legal aides and health woes pile up, but Cohn recedes from the narrative in the second half of the film, which is much less grounded in their relationship; though as Cohn weakens from a virus he steadfastly denied, the second hour is his turn to be portrayed more sympathetically than he deserves.

Strong has the same problem in his performance as Stan, in that Cohn is almost as media-saturated a figure as Trump. Strong gives Cohn a low, aggressive voice, slightly nasal and rounded, with casual and cruel inflections tossed out at a Succession-trained tempo; he bobs his neck up and down like a turtle on each syllable, but holds it forward tentatively as if the muscles are atrophying, as Cohn becomes frailer. It’s a credible performance, not remotely campy, but not really anything — there’s nothing here like the perspective on the role as interpreted by, say, the underground theater legend Ron Vawter in his performance piece Roy Cohn/Jack Smith, in which he gave Cohn a shrill, mincing Jewish voice, flaunting the traits most concealed and loathed by his recently deceased subject.

Recognizable figures are a fun challenge for actors, as well as for the hair, makeup, and wardrobe departments tasked with recreating iconic looks that everyone remembers from recent history. This year, election season is also Oscar-movie season, and you can expect some attention from the crafts teams on The Apprentice and maybe Strong or Sherman (one of the many glossy-magazine journalists to enjoy an elevated profile since the Trump years). I’m sure their acceptance speeches will be full of righteous anger directed at the new administration.

PUBLISHED 21 MAY 2024

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Mobile Muse List

Marvel

Morgan H. Stark (daughter of Tony Stark and Pepper Potts) Billy & Tommy Maximoff (twin sons of Wanda Maximoff and The Vision; MCU canon) Wendy Maximoff (First Class verse version of Wanda) Peter Parker (very AU) Peter Quill (very AU, based on Marvel’s What If. . ?) DJ Strange (OC daughter of Stephen Strange and Christine Palmer) Moth Strange (OC son of Stephen Strange and Christine Palmer)  Luciana Morbius (OC daughter of Michael Morbius and Martine Bancroft) Annika Foster (OC daughter of Jane Foster and Thor) Valentine Romanoff (OC daughter of Natasha Romanoff and Bucky Barnes) Eliot Ross (OC son of Betty Ross and Bruce Banner)

DC

Veronica Wayne (OC daughter of Bruce Wayne and Selina Kyle) Violet Lance-Queen (OC daughter of Laurel Lance and Oliver Queen) Zack Allen (OC son of Barry Allen and Kara Danvers, from another universe) Ronnie Raymond (AU) Eddie Thawne (AU) Tommy Merlyn (AU) Alice “Ace” Wayne (AU version of Ace from Batman: Beyond)

Horror

Eleanor Crain-Vance (AU) Beverly Marsh (inspired by both the 90′s miniseries and It Chapter 1 & 2)  Ben Hanscom (inspired by both the 90′s miniseries and It Chapter 1 & 2) Marshall, Ember, Winter & Addie Hanscom (OC children of Ben and Beverly) Georgie II & Victoria Denbrough (OC children of Bill and Audra) TK Kaspbrak (OC daughter of Eddie and Myra) Lucky & Lilah Hanlon (OC children of Mike Hanlon) Eli Tozier (OC son of Richie Tozier) Teddy Uris (OC son of Stan and Patti) Amelia Harker (OC great-granddaughter of Johnathan and Mina Harker) Oliver Harker (OC great-grandson of Johnathan and Mina Harker)  Miles Fairchild (mainly based on The Turning, but also has influences from The Haunting of Bly Manor, as well as the original source The Turn of the Screw) Flora Fairchild (mainly based on The Turning, but also has influences from The Haunting of Bly Manor, as well as the original source The Turn of the Screw) Bree Torrance (OC daughter of Dan Torrance)

Teen Wolf

Stiles Stilinski (canon divergent, “spark”) Malia Tate (canon divergent) Allison Argent (AU, disabled) Kira Yukimura (canon divergent) Isaac Lahey (canon divergent) Erica Reyes (AU) Riley Hale (OC daughter of Derek Hale and Braeden) Aria Montgomery (adapted AU, Stiles’ cousin)

Other

Life (OC based in The Sandman universe) Zorya of the Endless (OC daughter of Morpheus/Dream of the Endless) Aurora Bright-St. Claire (OC daughter of Malcolm Bright from Prodigal Son) Stefan Salvatore (AU, human doppelganger) Tyler Galpin (canon divergent) Teddy Lupin (canon divergent?) Jason Reid (OC son of Spencer Reid and Maeve Donovan) Henrietta Morgan (OC daughter of Derek Morgan and Penelope Garcia) Tallulah J Crowley (OC daughter of Archangel Gabriel adopted daughter of Crowley)

Original

Morgan Johnson (OC son of Life and Death) Emerald Blackwood (OC half-warlock, half-shifter)  Felicity Vanderwald (OC nephilim, descended from a fallen angel) Zanna Hendrix (OC inspired by the Audrey Hepburn film Wait Until Dark) Zack Szczesny (OC werewolf) Lincoln “Kennedy” Fell (OC demon) Maggie Crane (OC psychic medium) Jack Fisher (OC siren) Miranda Domingo (OC telepath) Stella-Rose Grant (OC immortal starlet) Gia Russo (OC immortal mob boss) Damien Zhang (OC cambion, stage magician) Perenelle Hughes (OC time traveller) Oz Shelley (OC fairy)