Ali Abbasi | 2hr
Not long after New York attorney Roy Cohn meets Donald Trump in The Apprentice, he imparts his three rules to winning. First rule: “Attack, attack, attack.” Begin the full-frontal assault early and take control of the situation. Second rule: “Admit nothing, deny everything.” Truth is irrelevant – no accusation can stick to you if you don’t let it. Lastly, he delivers the most important rule of all, assuring success even in the grip of failure.
“No matter what happens, no matter what they say about you, no matter how beaten you are, you claim victory and never admit defeat.”
These aggressive tactics should sound familiar to anyone who has paid the vaguest attention to American politics over the past decade, but director Ali Abbasi is not interested in retreading the well-worn ground of caricatures, insults, and superficial attempts to penetrate the president’s psyche. This Trump is still working for his father’s real estate business in 1970s New York, figuring out how to play the cruel game of capitalism and carve out his own legacy. There is no crossroads in his path to infamy here – with all the opportunities provided to him, he was always going to become the ruthless tycoon and bullish politician we recognise today. Instead, the onus lies with the cutthroat corporate culture which fostered his worst instincts, only beginning a serious self-reckoning once it falls under the shadow of its most profitable creation.
In The Apprentice, this establishment is largely personified in Cohn. Where Sebastian Stan plays a relatively passive role in the first act as young Trump, being guided through court cases and business lessons, Jeremy Strong often steals scenes with his gaunt face, beady eyes, and menacing presence. Even in their very first encounter, Abbasi cuts between a pair of slow zooms of their unbroken eye contact across a swanky New York bar, catching Trump in Cohn’s gaze like a shark locking onto its prey. With the added context of Cohn’s homosexuality, their silent interaction almost seems lustful, so it is no surprise that this device is reiterated later when Trump meets his future wife Ivana at another lavish club. This is a man thoroughly modelled in the image of his teacher, and Abbasi’s visual storytelling is efficient in tracing that striking formal comparison.
As Trump’s profile continues to grow across the decades, even the texture of the footage shifts as well, with its emulation of grainy 1970s film stock eventually giving way to the crackly VHS tape aesthetic of the 1980s. His favourite colour is pervasive in the golden lighting and production design, but within this worn analogue look, its shining opulence does not project warmth. Instead, it is gaudy, uninviting, and even a little smothering, complementing Martin Dirkov’s cold, domineering synths which pulsate with overbearing energy. By mixing real archival footage with staged reproductions of old newsreels too, Abbasi lays into a montage-heavy cinema verité style that marches persistently forward, setting a pace which Cohn realises is rapidly spiralling out of his control.
Quite ironically, there is enormous restraint in Stan’s depiction of this larger-than-life character, whose physical mannerisms and vocal patterns have been parodied to death. Although he disappears into the distinctive pout, hunch, and squint, these idiosyncrasies are relatively diluted in this youthful Trump, and only begin to intensify as his ego balloons over the years. What he lacks in Cohn’s subtlety and eloquence, he makes up for with a stubborn drive to succeed, trampling over his own family and undermining those who gave him a platform. When he explains what it takes to be a billionaire, he does not even possess the humility to credit anything other than his own innate ability.
“You have to be born with it. You have to have a certain gene.”
With dialogue this snappy, screenwriter Gabriel Sherman takes a great deal of inspiration from Aaron Sorkin, even as his philosophical underpinnings take a darker, more cynical direction. There are no idealistic soundbites here about heroes dying for their country, or decisions being made by those who show up. Instead, Sherman’s best one-liners succinctly expose the rotten foundation of American institutions. “This is a nation of men, not laws,” Cohn explains, encouraging Trump to throw out the old idiom about playing the ball, not the man. In fact, do the exact opposite, he instructs – “Play the man, not the ball.”
Of course, there is a level of hypocrisy to anyone who plays dirty, but who isn’t ready to have those same tactics thrown back at them. Behind closed doors, it only takes a few cheap jabs at Trump’s weight gain and hair loss for Ivana to get under his thin skin, provoking him to assert dominance through physical and sexual abuse. He simply can’t love anyone who can match him in boldness or business acumen, he confesses, and the cosmetic surgery he forced her to get doesn’t do it for him anymore. As for Cohn, vicious homophobic attacks serve as a shield, pre-emptively deflecting any potential persecution he might face for his own sexuality. It is a weak defence to say the least, naively trusting that those who see his vulnerability won’t exploit it, even after giving them a guide on how to do exactly that.
When two equally unscrupulous and insecure friends go for each other’s throats then, it is only a matter of time before it devolves into a shit-slinging contest. Cohn displays far greater self-awareness then Trump would ever be capable of, yet his remorse comes far too late. While this icon of America’s indomitable spirit rises to superstardom, the man who created him fades into obscurity, pridefully refusing to publicly admit that he has AIDs even when it relegates him to a wheelchair.
It is fitting that the final meeting between these former friends should take place at the cavernous monument to Trump’s cult of personality that is Mar-a-Lago, turning what initially appears to be an opportunity to bury the hatchet into one last kick in the guts. The set designs here are remarkable, continuing to weave through the entrepreneur’s trademark golden opulence, yet the sinister darkness which envelops them also calls to mind the similarly extravagant, cavernous Xanadu mansion in Citizen Kane. It is hard not to feel at least a shred of pity for Cohn as he weeps tears of remorse over his enormous birthday cake here, totally humiliated by the mocking, insincere charity of the monster he has created, yet at the same time we recognise the poetic irony in his downfall.
There is something almost Shakespearean in these dual character arcs, likening Cohn to a Julius Caesar figure who was ultimately assassinated by his own followers, and Trump to a Richard III ruler who reigns with terror, manipulation, and deceit. Quite notably though, this America does not punish such qualities in its leaders, but outright rejects those narrative conventions which dictate the necessity of moral consequences. Instead, The Apprentice earns a superb formal payoff in its epilogue which draws one final comparison between both men, revealing just how deeply rooted Cohn’s depraved ethos is in Trump’s being, and how easily he claims total ownership of it. This rising businessman and media personality will not suffer the same mistakes as his mentor, he decides, and as the haunting final shot reveals New York’s cityscape in his eye, it is apparent that his plans for total dominance do not end there.
The Apprentice is currently streaming on Stan, and is available to rent or buy on Apple TV, YouTube, and Amazon Video.