[natural sound: The Apprentice: main title theme, fades up then down]
MARY AMELIA WEISS: This title theme comes from the hit show The Apprentice, a reality TV show that ran from 2004 to 2015 and starred none other than Republican presidential nominee Donald J. Trump.
ILSE VON HEIMBURG: Lately, however, the title has been in the news for another reason. The Apprentice, a Trump biopic starring Sebastian Stan, debuted at the Cannes Film Festival in May and hit the big screen in mid-October.
[natural sound: The Apprentice movie trailer clip]
WEISS: Just mere weeks out from the presidential election, the film has generated controversy over the Republican candidate’s past.
VON HEIMBURG: The Apprentice chronicles Trump’s early years and follows Trump’s career as a growing real estate business mogul in the 1970s and 80s. It also explores his marriage to model Ivana Trump and his years-long professional relationship and friendship with controversial prosecutor Roy Cohn.
WEISS: We took it upon ourselves to speak to some moviegoers about their experience with the film. Political science student Natalie Roots-Nowakowski weighed in with her initial take.
NATALIE ROOTS NOWAKOWSKI: Sometimes there’s things that you can read in the news, but you don’t really understand them until you see it brought to life. So I think it did a good job at that.
WEISS: David Aguinaldo, a fellow movie viewer, shared a similar initial reaction.
DAVID AGUINALDO: I thought it was well acted, but I definitely left the movie feeling kind of sick to my stomach a little bit. I don’t know if I was surprised by anything within the film, but I think it’s interesting.
WEISS: Most viewers we spoke to seemed to think the film did a solid job at depicting the politician’s messy past. Like Aguinaldo noted, some scenes regarding Trump’s personal life were difficult for viewers to watch.
VON HEIMBURG: More than anything though, the focus on a defined few years in Trump’s life offers viewers perspective on why, exactly, the politician could be the way he is the way he is now, a reality that can be difficult for American viewers to process.
ROOTS-NOWAKOWSKI: Most of the acting we see with Trump is, like, very overdone animated making fun of all of his weird imperfections. But this was just like, like, the realism almost made it a little worse. And I had never heard of Roy Cohn, and I like to think myself pretty politically involved, so that was also really shocking. And then researching him afterwards, it just showed, I mean, we always hear politicians using their past as a way to connect with different voting groups. But Trump’s past is just him being rich and manipulating people to get power, so he doesn’t really highlight it.
[natural sound: clip from The Apprentice trailer]
WEISS: Additionally, some viewers expressed confusion over who, exactly, the film was made for. After all, it’s unlikely to change anyone’s vote just weeks away from a pivotal election.
AGUINALDO: You know, is it for the fans of Donald Trump? Not really. And it takes a certain kind of masochistic personality to choose somebody who doesn’t appreciate this particular person to put themselves through it. So there’s not really a great audience for this movie in America at least. I think it makes more sense that it was opened abroad earlier, because it seems that it would have done better abroad.
VON HEIMBURG: The Apprentice was not heavily promoted before release, and Trump’s legal team even attempted to prevent its release completely. With an unclear audience and a minimal media campaign, it comes as no surprise that the movie opened to a mediocre box office of 1.58 million.
Political science student Miles Heck discussed his experience with the movie’s lack of promotion.
MILES HECK: I didn’t ever really see ads for it before. I was only sort of learned about it, as my friends said they were going and i was like, oh, I haven’t even heard about this movie before. There hasn’t really been a discussion anywhere else in my life.
WEISS: And it also probably comes as no surprise that Trump himself objected to the movie, calling it a film made by “human scum” and a “politically disgusting hatchet job,” according to Variety.
VON HEIMBURG: Mattia Sabbara, who holds a pretty unfavorable opinion of Trump already, also weighed in:
MATTIA SABBARA: It’s sunlight on him. He likes to be not accountable for anything. He wants to be above the law. He wants to do all kinds of crimes. His underlings want to do all kinds of crimes.
VON HEIMBURG: Aguinaldo called Stan’s portrayal of Trump “fair,” but thought Trump’s reaction was completely predictable.
AGUINALDO: Yeah, I don’t really take any credence in what Donald Trump has to say…it’s pretty easy to believe that this movie is based upon things that really did happen. Obviously we don’t know what goes out behind closed doors, and that’s probably where the creative process kind of lies.
VON HEIMBURG: Roots-Nowakowski agreed.
ROOTS-NOWAKOWSKI: And I think that’s probably a very accurate representation, based on how it portrayed him, so I don’t blame him, and that seems like very typical rhetoric.
VON HEIMBURG: Now, despite the Trump campaign’s anger, The Apprentice director Ali Abbasi maintains that the film portrayed Trump as an actual human being, not a caricature, according to NBCNews. With the notable release date just before the election against Vice President and Democratic nominee Kamala Harris, Abbasi says he doubts the film will have much of an impact.
ROOTS-NOWAKOWSKI: I just went because my friend invited me, but I thought, like, me personally based on my own political beliefs and like and how I’m gonna vote this november. It just made me really scared, and it made the issue even more urgent in my mind.
HECK: I think it sort of is a little bit curious as to why they released it so close to an election. I’m wondering if there’s any thought into that time frame about that…
VON HEIMBURG: Heck somewhat accurately predicted the Trump campaign’s reaction to the film.
HECK: I don’t really think it will have a large effect at all, in my opinion. I do think, though, that it will get into Trump’s head a little bit. It didn’t portray him very well, and I could see him being very angry about that, and vindictive and like at a speech referencing that and how the producers are all formal, directors are corrupt, and stuff like that.
WEISS: Trump’s campaign spokesman Steven Cheung also called the film “election interference by Hollywood elites,” While viewers agreed the film will likely have little impact in swaying anyone’s vote this November, they said that it’s an important watch for anyone interested in the politician’s complicated past.
SABBARA: It was a good movie. Well made. Well made movie. I think it needed to be maybe four hours long to put everything and not everything, all the nasty stuff. Yeah, he’s a projectionist.
HECK: I think it was a very enlightening picture of how he grew up and the important challenges he overcame in his life, and how he’s sort of become the man he is today. Yeah, so I definitely think people should go see this movie.
[natural sound: clip from The Apprentice trailer]
WEISS: The true winners of the film are Sebastian Stan and Jeremy Strong, who have both been hailed by viewers and critics alike for their performances.
VON HEIMBURG: And whatever the outcome of this election season, if there’s one thing America knows, it’s that Hollywood will keep making movies.
WEISS: For WNUR News, I’m Mary Amelia Weiss.
VON HEIMBURG: And I’m Ilse von Heimburg.
