Why the Donald Trump biopic bombed

Ortenberg had no illusions that it would be an instant box office hit. “We look at this as a marathon, not a sprint,” he said. “It's not about opening weekend and it's not about how many screens or this or that. It's about the film's legacy, which I think will remain strong throughout awards season and beyond.” But this isn't the '70s or '80s, when an independent political drama like this could have found success through word of mouth. In the new cinema era, if you fail on the opening weekend, you are bankrupt, not least because the cinema operators simply give up their screens to other, more profitable films.

Ortenberg — who also acquired the rights to another controversial project, the Jonathan Majors-starrer “Magazine Dreams” — railed against his fellow distributors, none of whom were interested in releasing “The Apprentice.” “They are cowards,” he said. “Many in the industry are afraid of the consequences if Trump wins the election. And for me, that's heartbreaking. I always like to think that we are better as an industry and am constantly reminded that we are not.”

He may well be a partisan Democrat, and his intention with the film may have been to throw a hand grenade into the already heated political mix currently raging across America. But if Ortenberg had taken a step back, he might have asked himself whether The Apprentice, stellar reviews aside, was really the movie anyone needed or wanted to see at that moment.

The film's screenplay, written by Gabriel Sherman, was considered one of Hollywood's hottest properties when he wrote it in 2018, midway through Trump's first term. It was offered to many of the great directors working today, including Clint Eastwood and Paul Thomas Anderson, both of whom are adept at small-scale political dramas. But both refused. “The producers of The Apprentice had difficulty finding the right director who would risk his career,” Abassi later said. “They had to assess the business risk.”