“My initial reaction is, ‘Wow, how the hell am I going to do this?”
His friends and family also had concerns.
“I had people tell me not to do it,” he admits.
Sebastian Stan and Jeremy Strong.Danny Kasirye
“I had people tell me I don’t look like him.
I had people tell me that it’s not safe for me to do it.
I had people say that I shouldn’t venture to alienate half the country.”
Sebastian Stan.Danny Kasirye
“Jeremy is an unusual actor.
Even the other actors think Jeremy is unusual, and they’re all weird,” he jokes.
Deep in character
Both actors disappeared into their roles for the duration of the shoot.
Jeremy Strong.Danny Kasirye
Asked what they learned about each other during the production, Strong quips, “Nothing at all.
“The timing of the shoot just didn’t allow for anything outside of it,” adds Stan.
“And I think in a way that was really beneficial.”
Sebastian Stan and Jeremy Strong.Danny Kasirye
Doing the homework
To prepare for the role, Stan did extensive research into the former president.
A lost boy
For Strong, finding his way into Cohn meant starting at the beginning.
“He lived with his mom well into his 40s,” he adds.
Sebastian Stan.Danny Kasirye
He was like an evil Peter Pan.
He was eccentric, he was gleeful, and he was unrepentant, ruthless, merciless.”
I really think it’s that portentous and that significant."
Jeremy Strong.Danny Kasirye
“You are trying to render with a certain level of exactitude this person, their behavior.
In Roy’s case, the way he spoke, the way he carried himself physically.
It involved some physical transformation in terms of losing weight and changing my appearance.”
Jeremy Strong and Sebastian Stan.Danny Kasirye
Still, Strong adds, “That stuff is all, in a way, cosmetic.
You have to check your judgments at the door and be interrogated simply on a humanistic level.
With this, it was peering into the heart of darkness.”
Jeremy Strong.Danny Kasirye
For a while, we were getting closer to shooting and we hadn’t agreed on the prosthetics.
“I think it attempts to understand where they came from and how they became who they are.
Will he watch?
Sebastian Stan.Danny Kasirye
“I hope he sees the movie,” Strong says of Trump.
I hope he sees it that would alone be worth making it.”
And the only way to do that is sometimes to confront it with its opposite.
Jeremy Strong and Sebastian Stan.Danny Kasirye
Read ourfull cover story onThe Apprentice, in theaters Oct. 11.
Jeremy Strong.Danny Kasirye
Sebastian Stan.Danny Kasirye
