A new Donald Trump biopic is in the works, but this time it’s set to portray him in a much more positive light.
Last year, The Apprentice, starring Sebastian Stan as the Republican leader and US President, was released.
The plot is set in the 1970s and 80s as Trump forges a career for himself as a real estate businessman, long before his political endeavours and becoming one of the most powerful men in the world.
Trump himself slated the project, describing the film as a ‘defamatory, politically disgusting hatchet job’ that sought to thwart his reelection campaign last autumn.
However, he might be a bigger fan of the upcoming flick, which is believed to have a ‘kinder’ approach.
It’s still early days, but a whopping $100,000,000 (£75.2m) is being thrown into the biopic, according to Deadline.
Currently unnamed, the film is set to be promoted to potential investors at Cannes Film Festival this month.
A director is yet to be attached, as is an actor to portray 78-year-old Trump.
However, Andrea Iervolino, who served as a producer of Ferrari and To The Bone, is set to work on the film and bring a wider picture of Trump’s life to the silver screen.
While the movie will have a whopping budget, it’s currently unclear whether Trump himself is involved or has given it his seal of approval.
Iervolino hopes to get the cameras rolling at the end of 2025.
Speaking about the film, Iervolino sold the biopic as ‘a major new biographical film centred on the life and legacy of Donald J. Trump — real estate mogul, television icon, and 45th and 47th President of the United States’.
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Iervolino added: ‘Whether one agrees or disagrees with his politics, there’s no denying Donald Trump’s impact on the modern era.
‘As a producer, I’m interested in exploring the deeper story of the man—the rise, the challenges, the resilience.
‘Our goal is to deliver a film that is bold, balanced, and artistically ambitious.’
While Trump has been kicking around for decades and began his first term as president in 2017, The Apprentice was the first time he’d been depicted by Hollywood.
The film, with a $16million (£12m) budget and also starring Jeremy Strong, was nominated at the Oscars, but it rubbed the man himself up the wrong way.
His election campaign actually sent a cease-and-desist letter to the makers of The Apprentice, with Trump ranting on Truth Social: ‘A FAKE and CLASSLESS Movie written about me, called, “The Apprentice” (Do they even have the right to use that name without approval?), will hopefully “bomb.”
‘It’s a cheap, defamatory, and politically disgusting hatchet job, put out right before the 2024 Presidential Election, to try and hurt the Greatest Political Movement in the History of our Country, “MAKE AMERICA GREAT AGAIN!”‘
He concluded: ‘So sad that HUMAN SCUM, like the people involved in this hopefully unsuccessful enterprise, are allowed to say and do whatever they want in order to hurt a Political Movement, which is far bigger than any of us. MAGA2024!’
Lead actor Stan was clearly unbothered by backlash from Trump, though, having anticipated it might not be his favourite movie in the world.
Addressing the President’s comments, he told The Hollywood Reporter‘s Awards Chatter podcast that Trump is a ‘paranoid, scared little man.’
Having received an eight-minute standing ovation at last year’s Cannes, Stan added: ‘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.’
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