Sebastian Stan, the actor who portrays a young Donald Trump in the hot-button film The Apprentice, slammed the former president and current Republican presidential nominee during an interview on Sunday, less than 48 hours before Election Day, calling him a “paranoid, scared little man” who “ain’t caring about your situation.”
Stan made the comments about Trump — his strongest since the film’s world premiere at the Cannes Film Festival in May, North American premiere at the Telluride Film Festival in September and U.S. theatrical release in October — during a recording of a forthcoming episode of The Hollywood Reporter‘s Awards Chatter podcast that was taped in front of an audience at the Miami Film Festival GEMS event.
Stan reminded the audience that they can stream The Apprentice on V.O.D. before casting their ballot — “and if you’re living in this country, you should, because it’s your right to,” he emphasized, adding, “You have the right to be curious and know what there is to know.” He continued, “What is really so controversial about this film? I mean, I think what’s the scariest part is our own level of denial of reality at this point. If you want to really know, it’s out there, it’s all been documented for the last 30, 40 years.” Everything that’s in this film has been documented and it’s out there.””
Stan vented, “There’s people that are going to say, ‘We don’t know what the truth is anymore.’ That’s the problem! He [Trump] has muddled it up so much… You can create your own truth at this point, believe what you want, and that’s what people are doing. But I think if you really care, you can still find it.”
As for the value of presenting facts in a film, as opposed to another form? “I can sit here and tell you things you’ve heard already for, like, 30,000 hours, and it’s not really going to make a difference,” he lamented. “You hear facts, we all hear information, but you don’t experience it. It’s the experience of being with this person for two hours, and seeing where he’s coming from, and really asking yourself at the end of this film, ‘Do you trust this person? Do you really trust that this guy is going to make a decision that’s going to be good for you or good for him?’ And let me tell you something: There is one paranoid, scared little man that’s still out there fighting the good fight to get into the membership club of Manhattan and be put on a plaque on a wall. He ain’t caring about your situation. It’s that he‘s got to get there first. And that’s just what the film is.”
Stan, who was born in Romania and immigrated to America with his mother when he was 12, said he was drawn to The Apprentice because he feels it is fundamentally about the American dream: “What essentially started with my sort of dismissive, judgmental attitude of this guy started to shape into something bigger, which was not just about this guy, but also about a certain mindset and this idea of the American dream as we know it, and what is it, really? Because I had been obsessing about it since my mom, in New York City, pointed to the Twin Towers, and all around us, and said, ‘This is the promised land, this is the land of the free, this is the land of opportunity. This is where you can become someone. And I sacrificed my life for you to get here.’ And so I have always been in love with this idea. I am sort of an example of the American dream. I’ve lucked out.”
He continued, “The movie was asking the question, ‘What is the cost?’ And this man was sort of a really good example of what can happen as a result when you lose who you are because you are so focused on one thing and that nothing else matters, not even your humanity.”
Is the actor concerned about possible repercussions for making the film or speaking out now about Trump, given the very real possibility that Trump will be re-elected and — as he has vowed — seek retribution against those who have opposed him? “I’ve had a lot of people telling me not to do it,” Stan acknowledged. “I mean, you very well know Jimmy Kimmel asked me if I still have my Romanian passport, based on him [Trump] trying to deport American citizens. As he [Kimmel] just said, ‘Sounds like Europe’s going to be the place’ for me. But yeah, I don’t believe in fear… Again, I come from a place where people were silenced and were taught to live in fear. And that was another reason why I was like, ‘I have to do it.’”
