Sebastian Stan debuts mercifully mild Donald Trump impersonation in first The Apprentice clip

How many goddamn Donald Trump impressions have we been subjected to since 2016? The man was already inescapable; the impressions were further torment. Refreshingly, Sebastian Stan isn’t putting on the voice or pursing his lips and squinting his eyes in The Apprentice. He still sounds like the Donald Trump we know—or that we’ll come to know, given that The Apprentice first look clip shows the future president in training to become the insufferable braggart he’s destined to be.  

It’s been a long road to this Apprentice clip, given that Trump and his supporters were trying to stop this movie from ever coming out. The film was finally picked up for distribution by Briarcliff Entertainment last week. The synopsis reads, “A young Donald Trump (Sebastian Stan), eager to make his name as a hungry scion of a wealthy family in 1970s New York, comes under the spell of Roy Cohn (Jeremy Strong), the cutthroat attorney who would help create the Donald Trump we know today. Cohn sees in Trump the perfect protégé—someone with raw ambition, a hunger for success, and a willingness to do whatever it takes to win.”

Up to now, one image of this movie has been prominently circulating, of Stan and Strong in the back of a car together. The Apprentice first look clip brings that image to life, a frenetic scene of Cohn setting up a phone interview with a reporter, goading young Trump into more and more grandiose statements about his real estate plans. It’s Strong who sounds more like a Trump impression here—not in an exaggerated sketch comedy way, but in a way that makes clear this up-and-coming version of Trump stole his mannerisms from his mentor. The scene plays out almost comically, the dramatic irony being we all know Trump took these lessons to heart and scammed his way all the way to the top. His villain origin story, which The A.V. Club gave a B+, will debut in theaters October 11.