When Jeremy Strong decided to play Roy Cohn, he didn't just put on a suit. He basically signed up to inhabit a "heart of darkness" that most actors would run away from. Honestly, it’s a lot. If you’ve seen the 2024 film The Apprentice, you know exactly what I’m talking about. Strong, who we all know as the tortured Kendall Roy from Succession, takes on a different kind of monster here. He plays the man who basically "made" Donald Trump.
It’s not just a movie; it’s a blueprint of how modern American power works.
Cohn was a guy who thrived on chaos. He was the chief counsel to Senator Joseph McCarthy during the Red Scare. He sent the Rosenbergs to the electric chair. And then, in the 70s and 80s, he became the ultimate New York fixer. Strong plays him as a "ghoul, part Lost Boy, part kingmaker." It’s chilling.
The Jeremy Strong Roy Cohn Metamorphosis
You’ve probably heard stories about how Strong prepares for roles. People call it "Method," but he hates that term. He calls it a "humanistic investigation." For this role, he went down a deep, dark rabbit hole. He watched the documentary Where’s My Roy Cohn? until his eyes probably hurt. He read everything the man ever wrote.
Strong actually spoke to people who knew the real Roy Cohn, including Roger Stone. Can you imagine that conversation? Stone apparently told Strong that watching his performance felt like being in the room with the real Roy again.
Why the performance works
Most actors play Roy Cohn as a cartoon villain. Al Pacino did it in Angels in America with a lot of fire and brimstone. James Woods played him like a puckish trickster. But Strong? He plays him as someone who is "marinating in his own malignance."
- The Tics: Strong mastered the nasal, "straight-outta-the-Bronx" voice.
- The Look: He lost a dangerous amount of weight to capture Cohn’s late-life battle with AIDS.
- The Vibe: There’s a "reptilian" quality to the way he moves his tongue and stares.
It’s about "the art that hides the art." He isn't winking at the camera. He isn't telling you to hate Roy. He's just being Roy.
The Three Rules of the Game
The core of the movie—and the real-life history of Roy Cohn and Jeremy Strong’s portrayal—is the three rules. These aren't just movie dialogue. These were Cohn’s actual tenets that he drilled into a young Donald Trump’s head.
- Attack, attack, attack. Never be on the defensive.
- Admit nothing, deny everything. Even if you’re caught red-handed.
- No matter what happens, claim victory. Never admit defeat.
When you watch Sebastian Stan (as Trump) and Strong in those early scenes at Le Club, you see the "Frankenstein" moment happening. Cohn sees this "lump of formless clay" in the young real estate heir and decides to mold him.
It's a mentor-protégé relationship that is basically Shakespearean. There’s a scene where Trump gives Cohn a pair of diamond cufflinks. Later, it’s revealed they were fakes. That actually happened in real life. It’s a brutal metaphor for their entire relationship.
Dealing with the Dark Side
Is it okay to have empathy for someone like Roy Cohn? That’s the big question people are asking. Strong says we should. Not because we condone what he did—Cohn was a man who persecuted gay people while being a closeted gay man himself—but because understanding the "toxic cocktail" that makes a person is the job of art.
Strong describes Cohn as a "clusterf—k of a person." He was both monstrous and childlike. He was "gleeful" while being vicious.
The movie doesn't shy away from the grime of 1970s New York. It looks like "CHUD-like rot and decay." It’s the perfect setting for a man who famously said he didn't care about the law, only about who the judge was.
What People Get Wrong About the Film
A lot of people think The Apprentice is just a political hit piece. But if you actually watch it, it’s more of a tragedy. It’s about the "extinction-level event" of a soul.
Strong’s performance captures the moment the veil of self-deception finally drops. At the end, when Cohn is dying of AIDS—a disease he publicly denied having until the very end—you see a man staring into the "infinite emptiness of his own wasted life."
Actionable Takeaways for Movie Lovers
If you're planning to watch the film or want to dive deeper into this history, here is how to get the most out of it:
- Watch the Documentaries First: Before seeing the movie, check out Where’s My Roy Cohn? by Matt Tyrnauer. It gives you the factual baseline so you can appreciate the nuances in Strong's performance.
- Look for the "Easter Eggs": Gabriel Sherman, the writer, is a journalist. He packed the script with real "Trumpisms" and Cohn quotes. Pay attention to phrases like "dead duck" or "phony as a three-dollar bill."
- Observe the Physicality: Notice how Strong’s walk changes as the movie progresses. He starts as a shark and ends as a ghost.
The legacy of Roy Cohn isn't just in the history books. As Strong puts it, "We’re living in his world now." The denial of reality and the "attack" culture we see every day? That’s the house that Roy built.
To really understand the current landscape of American power, you have to look at the teacher. By inhabiting Roy Cohn, Jeremy Strong gives us a terrifyingly clear window into how we got here. It's a performance that doesn't just ask for an Oscar—it asks for an exorcism.