Sebastian Stan Reveals After Golden Globe Win For ‘A Different Man’ That Playing “The Man In Orange” In ‘Apprentice’ Was “The Hardest”

Anthony D'Alessandro

5 January 2025 at 10:32 pm·2-min read

Sebastian Stan Reveals After Golden Globe Win For ‘A Different Man’ That Playing “The Man In Orange” In ‘Apprentice’ Was “The Hardest”

Not to diminish his Golden Globe win for playing a disfigured man who undergoes facial reconstruction surgery in A Different Man, but for Sebastian Stan the hardest role to play in his career was “the man in orange” aka Donald Trump in this year’s The Apprentice.

Stan won his first Golden Globe tonight in Best Actor Male Actor Comedy or Musical for the A24 feature A Different Man. It was one of two noms tonight for the Marvel Studios thespian who is also up for Best Actor Feature Drama for playing Trump in The Apprentice. Back in the press room, as reporter asked the actor what the hardest role of his career has been.

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“The man in orange was the hardest to play,” said Stan.

Stan called playing a Trump “a big risk” and “in itself really difficult.”

“The responsibility I carried, it was about The Apprentice, wanting to do the best I can to honor Ali Abbasi’s vision,” Stan said. The movie, which made its world premiere at the Cannes Film Festival, struggled in finding a U.S. distributor before Briarcliff Entertainment saved it. Released roughly a month before the presidential election, The Apprentice didn’t attract a Trump sized voter turnout at the box office with a $4M take.

Stan did acknowledge “the dark place” he had to go for A Different Man. In the movie, Edward Lemuel is a struggling actor with neurofibromatosis. He befriends his new neighbor Ingrid Vold, an aspiring playwright, but is too nervous to act on his romantic feelings towards her. After receiving an experimental medical treatment that cures him of his condition, he assumes the identity of “Guy Moratz” and claims that Edward has killed himself.

Stan gave thanks to Michael Marino’s prosthetics for getting him into character; Marino also having worked on The Penguin. “It informed my subconscious,” says Stan who next reprises his role as Bucky Barnes in Marvel Studios’ Thunderbolts*.

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