After much anticipation and fanfare, the Donald Trump-focused biopic The Apprentice was released in theaters on Friday—and it includes several moments that are sure to leave the audience clutching their collective pearls.
Ali Abbasi directed the biopic which bears the same name as the business-themed reality show that Donald Trump fronted years before becoming president. Sebastian Stan deftly plays Donald Trump as he builds his real estate empire in New York City between the 1970s and 1980s under the tutelage of his lawyer and mentor Roy Cohn (portrayed to devastating effect by Succession star Jeremy Strong).
While the film does allude to Donald Trump’s political ambitions, it doesn’t include his 2016 and 2020 presidential campaigns or his four years as president, instead focusing on his origin story and rise as Cohn’s ultimate apprentice.
Months before the film hit screens, Steven Cheung, the communications director for Donald Trump’s election campaign, told Newsweek that there were plans to sue.
Jeremy Strong (left) as Roy Cohn and Sebastian Stan as Donald Trump in the movie “The Apprentice.” The film was released on Friday.
Pieff Weyman
“We will be filing a lawsuit to address the blatantly false assertions from these pretend filmmakers,” he said. “This garbage is pure fiction which sensationalizes lies that have been long debunked.
“As with the illegal Biden Trials, this is election interference by Hollywood elites, who know that President Trump will retake the White House and beat their candidate of choice because nothing they have done has worked.
“This ‘film’ is pure malicious defamation, should not see the light of day, and doesn’t even deserve a place in the straight-to-DVD section of a bargain bin at a soon-to-be-closed discount movie store, it belongs in a dumpster fire.”
As for what, in particular, may have riled up Donald Trump’s team, Newsweek has listed some of the more shocking moments from the newly-released movie.
Rape Scene
In one scene, The Apprentice depicts Donald Trump as raping his then-wife Ivana Trump (played by Maria Bakalova) following an argument. While the allegations have been publicly discussed over the years, the scene makes for jarring viewing as the glamorous couple’s marital troubles rise to the fore.
In her 1990 divorce deposition, Ivana Trump alleged that she had been sexually assaulted by her former husband. She disavowed the allegation in 2015 when Donald Trump was running for president.
Ivana Trump, who died in 2022, denied the claims when a book revealing the allegations in the deposition was about to be published, according to ABC News.
“I have recently read some comments attributed to me from nearly 30 years ago at a time of very high tension during my divorce from Donald,” she said in her 2015 statement. “The story is totally without merit. Donald and I are the best of friends and together have raised 3 children that we love and are very proud of.”
Drug Use
While earlier parts of the film portray Donald Trump as a man who has an aversion to recreational drugs and can’t hold his liquor, later scenes show Stan’s version of him habitually popping “diet pills” that he boasts boost his energy.
Of course, given that decades later the perfect diet pill remains elusive, this fix-all for the business mogul turns out to be amphetamines, which his doctor so succinctly describes to his unwitting patient as “cheap speed.”
It turns out to be the main character’s sole foray into recreational drug use, although he is surrounded by it. Even the opening credits of the movie portray wild, debauched partying, abundant drug use, crime, and riots as a decaying New York City in desperate need of revitalization is shown.
Going Under the Knife
After watching Cohn’s mentorship transform Donald Trump into the business magnate the public has come to know in recent decades, viewers see the future president expressing concerns about his appearance.
Most notably, he’s shown expressing dissatisfaction with his expanding torso (while refusing to exercise to combat the issue), as well as a developing bald patch on his scalp. The solution agreed upon, the movie portrays, is surgery.
The movie’s Donald Trump is shown getting liposuction, as well as scalp reduction surgery, the results of which appear to please the entrepreneur, as he later emerges with the distinctive hairstyle we know him to bear to this day.
Racially-Charged Language
A young Donald Trump is shown entering Cohn’s orbit as he asks the lawyer to represent him in a court battle over alleged discriminatory practices.
In 1973—a decade after the Civil Rights Act, and five years after the Fair Housing Act—the Department of Justice sued Trump Management for its discriminatory practices, which activist groups had meticulously recorded for years.
Donald Trump and his father, Fred Trump, who were both named as defendants, responded by accusing the Department of Justice of defamation and filing a $100 million countersuit. The messy legal battle ended with the Trumps signing a consent decree, an agreement that allows both parties to end a dispute without admitting fault.
In The Apprentice, Fred Trump (Martin Donovan) is shown complaining at the family dinner table about “NAACP f******” before declaring: “How can I be racist when I have a Black driver?”
Speaking with the younger Trump in a later scene, Cohn expresses his distaste for “this whole Civil Rights deal” as he asks “how many stuffed-shirt leftists want their little Johnnies and Janes in school with little negros? Zero.”
Sex and Debauchery
While the portrayal of consensual sex is nothing new in this day and age, Stan’s version of Donald Trump appears visibly shocked when he walks in on Cohn engaged in group sex while attending a wild party at the lawyer’s home.
Donald Trump’s intimate moments with his future wife are also portrayed. Later in the movie, as his marriage crumbles, Donald Trump is also shown with his pants down as a woman performs a sex act on him.
For the most part, Donald Trump is portrayed largely strait-laced as his rise in social status sees him navigating in circles that, it appears, he normally wouldn’t.
Honorary Mention
While this one does not make the list as a shocking moment, it’s certainly worth an honorary mention: Cohn teaching a rookie Donald Trump his philosophy on how to win.
The first rule, the movie’s lawyer says, is to “attack, attack, attack.” The young apprentice is also advised to “admit nothing, deny everything.”
Third? “This is the most important rule of all,” Strong’s Cohn says. “No matter what happens, no matter what they say about you, no matter how beaten you are, you claim victory and never admit defeat… You want to win, that’s how you win.”
Donald Trump is portrayed as taking this advice to heart, confidently repeating it years later and presenting the approach to life as his own.
The moment seeks to portray a distancing between the apprentice and his mentor as one rises and the other falls. In 1986, Cohn was disbarred by the Appellate Division of the New York State Supreme Court for unethical conduct.
Weeks later, before his death from AIDS-related complications, Cohn is seen receiving “diamond cufflinks” for his 59th birthday from Donald Trump at his Florida property.
As he shows the gift to Ivana Trump, with whom he is seated at the other end of the dinner party table than Donald Trump, the former model informs him: “This is cheap pewter. The stone is zirconia… Donald has no shame.”
