Jeremy Strong has reflected on his portrayal of the late Roy Cohn in Ali Abassi’s daring Donald Trump biopic, The Apprentice.
The Succession star, 46, co-led the 2024 drama alongside Sebastian Stan, who plays a young Trump. The controversial film follows Trump’s ascent into real estate as he’s taken under the wing of the cutthroat lawyer and political fixer Cohn.
Cohn, who died from AIDS in 1986 without ever publicly admitting that he was homosexual nor ever disclosing that he was HIV-positive, is often credited with “creating” Trump.
Asked in a new Q&A profile with British GQ if his role as Cohn gave him any kind of empathy for Trump, especially given his recent political doings, Strong responded hesitantly.
“Maybe,” he said. “Certainly when I was doing it and sort of inside of it, I felt kinship with the Donald character.”
Before continuing, Strong said that he wanted to be careful with his words, noting that “it feels dangerous.”
“There’s a line that was omitted from the movie, but basically it defined what linked them, which was in Roy’s words, that they were both willing to walk over fresh corpses to get what they want,” he added. “And so that sort of dark alliance and kinship, I certainly felt while we were making it.”
As to whether it changed his perception of Trump “on a human level,” he admitted: “Probably. I mean, whether it’s Roy Cohn, or even Lee Harvey Oswald [in 2013’s Parkland], or Kendall Roy [in Succession], or any of these characters — I get the sense that people label them despicable, monstrous, whatever.
“And I don’t disagree with that in some cases, but you have to suspend your judgment to try and walk in their shoes and understand them,” he acknowledged. “And part of that is understanding their pain and understanding their drive and their need. Those are the things, as an actor, you have to latch on to.”
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Strong is known for his dedication to the craft and is often characterized as a method actor, something he has denied. In 2021, his deep commitment came under scrutiny after a New Yorker profile seemingly mocked him for taking every role he lands as “seriously as his own life.”
He later spoke out about the infamous article, labeling it his “15 minutes of shame.”
Earlier this month, the Emmy-winning actor appeared in a Dunkin’ Donuts Super Bowl commercial alongside brothers Ben and Casey Affleck. In the promo, Strong is seen submerged in an entire vat of coffee grounds.
“We’re doing a Dunkin’ Donuts commercial, right? I’m just trying to find the character. I think I found a way in,” he tells Ben, who asks how long it’s going to take for him to be finished with his “bean method.”
Explaining his intentions behind appearing in the Dunkin’ commercial, Strong told British GQ: “I did this because it was my answer and response to all of that stuff. A repudiation of it. A way, in its own form of risk, of actually poking fun at myself, poking fun at this absurd notion.
“I’ve never called myself a Method actor. Never once. The Bean Method is as absurd or as legitimate as these ideas that are going around. So I had fun with that and I thought it was just a way of saying, ‘Listen, I take what I do extremely seriously, but I don’t take myself all that seriously.’”
