Tom Ortenberg’s studio has purchased the hot-button film and is planning to give the movie a full-on awards push.
The Hollywood Reporter has revealed that Ali Abbasi’s upcoming film, The Apprentice, which tells the story of Donald Trump’s rise in the real estate game, has now been acquired by Tom Ortenberg’s Briarcliff Entertainment. Briarcliff has scheduled the film to be released weeks before the U.S. Presidential Election on October 11. Additionally, the studio plans to give the movie an awards push. The upcoming Thunderbolts star, Sebastian Stan, will be donning the hair to play Trump, and Succession‘s Jeremy Strong will portray Trump’s one-time consigliere, Roy Cohn.
The Apprentice will follow the future U.S. President from his twenties through his late thirties and will “examine his efforts to build his real estate business in New York over the course of the ’70s and ’80s, also digging into his relationship with infamous attorney Roy Cohn.” The film description also adds that the project is “billed as an exploration of power and ambition set in a world of corruption and deceit. It’s a mentor-protege story that charts the origins of an American dynasty.” Alongside Sebastian Stan and Jeremy Strong, Borat 2 and Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3‘s Maria Bakalova also signed on to play Ivana Trump.
The project was penned by long-time Vanity Fair Donald Trump chronicler Gabriel Sherman, whose book The Loudest Voice in the Room inspired the Showtime series starring Russell Crowe as Roger Ailes. It is said that in the time before its wide release, the film is being planned to screen at some fall film festivals and it will be receiving a full-on awards campaign, which Ortenberg has been successful in with past projects like Crash and Spotlight.
THR’s review of the film from Cannes stated, “What Abassi’s film reveals most of all is the extent to which the toxicity that’s now an inescapable part of our contemporary reality was shaped by the unholy alliance between two men half a century ago.” The film has garnered positive reception so far and it has a current standing of 77% on Rotten Tomatoes.