#Sebastian review rise

[luci-in-trenchcoats]

The Princess & The Playboy (Part 6)

Summary: Sam and Max's plan to get their siblings invited to a party may have worked but Sebastian Monroe is a dangerous man and they may have just put not only their lives but their families at risk too...

Masterlist

Pairing: NFL Quarterback!Dean x Pop Star!reader

Word Count: 5,400ish

Warnings: language, family trauma/angst, kidnapping

A/N: Uh oh...

_________

Two Weeks Later

Reader POV

“Damn,” said Dean, shaking out his arm after you’d tossed him a football in the backyard. “I’m going to need your arm workout and no, I am not joking.”

“Oh my god, did I tell you the dance choreographer wanted me to learn to do a handstand so I could sing, upside down? I shut that shit down so fast,” you said, Dean gently tossing the ball back to you. 

“I’m sure you could do it. But I don’t blame you for not wanting to,” he said, catching the ball one handed. “Do you get a lot of say in that stuff? Dance moves?”

“That would require me to be able to dance,” you laughed, clasping both arms around the ball when he threw it back.

“She’s right. God awful dancer when it’s not choreographed. Miracle she can fake it as well as she does,” said Eric from the patio table, glancing up from his phone. “It’s four by the way.”

“Ugh. Why’d we say yes to this stupid party?” you asked. Dean shrugged.

“This guy donates a bunch of money to the Wolves charity every year. Plus Emma said it’s not a bad idea to go to a charity event together. Apparently it helps the public not think of me as such a scoundrel.” You tossed him the ball one last time, clasping your hands behind your back.

“I mean you are the big bad playboy corrupting the virtue of the sweet princess of pop,” you said, batting your eyes, twirling your hips. You grinned when he frowned, his eyes like a predator sizing up his prey. “I think the media is right about you. Such a bad influence.”

“Oh keep it up, princess, and I’ll tell them you ain’t innocent in the slightest.”

“Someone put me out of my misery,” groaned Eric, rising to his feet. “I’m getting dressed and going over protocols with the team. We’ll head out at seven.”

“Ain’t it kind of early to get ready?” asked Dean as you tossed him the ball one last time. Eric only laughed and headed inside, Dean cocking his head at you. “I know girls take a long time to get ready but three hours?”

“Shower. Shave. Makeup. Hair. Plus I told Sloane I’d help do her hair and pick out a dress,” you said, Dean humming. “I’m sure there’s a college game on you could watch for awhile.”

“I got some game film I can review,” he said, a heavy sigh in his shoulders. You wrapped your arms around him, Dean ditching the ball to return it. “It just never ends.”

“You love football, though,” you said, Dean nodding. 

“I do. But every year it’s getting to be more and more. I know you understand the pressure of it all. I just…I’m tired. I want to have more of a life outside my job,” he said, sliding his hands down your arms, taking your hands in his. “Does that make sense?”

“Yeah,” you said softly, Dean sharing the same sad smile you wore. “Me, I can have less tour dates and not put out an album every single year. I can make more wiggle room for myself. But I know you can’t. And sometimes I worry when I watch you play, pushing your body so hard.”

“I’m incredibly lucky I’m the least sacked QB in the league. I’ve had only one surgery and that was cause I broke my toe like an idiot on a coffee table. I don’t want to be like these guys that stay in too long and wind up with so much pain at forty. Or worse.” 

“I guess the thing to ask yourself is, do you want to keep going? Or could you walk away and be satisfied?” you asked. He breathed deeply and closed his eyes. 

“All I know is I used to put my head down, bury myself in the game. All I looked forward to was getting to the season, the start of a game, feeling that rush. This year…I’m looking forward to being done with work and games way too much. It’s like I’d rather be somewhere else…with someone else,” he murmured.

You nodded, squeezing his hands. “Nothing to decide today.”

“I know. Go get ready. I can occupy myself for a few hours.”

“Damn,” you said when it was nearly seven. Sloane looked down at herself alarmed, glancing back worried. “Sloane, you’re fucking hot.”

“I’m forty two,” she scoffed, smoothing out the floor length gown. “I’m not hot.”

“Hell yeah you are,” you said, Sloane tucking a strand of freshly curled hair behind her ear. “Eric’s going to fucking drool.”

“He better not,” she mumbled, taking a breath as she put her leg up on a chair and hiked the skirt portion up. She opened up her clutch sat on the end of the bed and slapped a very small thigh holster on her right leg, a smaller than usual gun inside. 

“Right. Cause really hot women packing heat are total turn offs for him,” you said, adjusting the strap that ran across your shoulder. She pouted and you handed her the clutch. “You said you could work with him tonight. We’re only bringing two of you inside and we wanted our best.”

“I can. He’s good about not speaking about anything but strictly work lately,” she said, sitting on the bed. “Does he seem…different to you?”

You knew why she was asking. Eric had told you he needed a few hours a week off for therapy a few weeks back. You practically jumped for joy that he was going to get some help to work through some things. Then it all shattered when he said it was related to his dad and needing to address some stuff he did to him as a kid. He didn’t share more but you had a feeling that had as much impact on him as his days in the military, probably more.

“It’s hard to tell with him,” you said, trying to respect his privacy. Plus, it actually was difficult to see a difference. Eric held everything close to the chest. Sometimes too much.

“Yeah. There’ll be no issues working together this evening,” she said, forcing a smile. You wanted to offer some reassurance that he was trying and maybe someday things between them could change. But honestly, you had no clue if they would work things out.

“Good. Well, let’s go see the boys.” A moment later you were coming down the stairs, Dean and Eric wandering out from the front hall in their tuxedos. Eric had always looked handsome when he dressed up but Dean?

He was walking sin in the tailored outfit, showing off his large shoulders and trim waist. You could feel the heat in your cheeks when he stared like he wanted to devour you then and there.

“Wow,” said Dean, a growing smile on his face, eyeing you up and down. It was a fairly simple dress. Black. One shoulder and a thin strap on the other. Form fitting up top before it became loose at the hips. It probably didn’t match black tie standard one hundred percent but it’d been sitting in your closet for two years and you finally had an excuse to wear it.

“Wow yourself,” you said, tugging on the lapel of his jacket. “Put you in one of these and you’d never imagine you spend literally every single day in flannels, henleys, and black tees.”

“Strange considering I’ve seen you wearing those clothing items a lot more yourself lately,” he teased, grinning down like a cat staring at the mouse it’d cornered.

“Oh, just a coincidence,” you said, Eric clearing his throat. You rolled your eyes, getting a roll in return. “You look nice too, Eric. I know you need the compliment on your appearance or your ego will bust.”

“Why did I take this job,” he mumbled to himself, staring at Sloane as she walked ahead for the front door. “You look beautiful.”

Sloane stopped dead in her tracks, looking over her shoulder at him, his gaze shooting to you. 

“I know you’ve wanted to wear that dress for awhile,” he said to you, Sloane rolling her eyes and walking outside. Eric closed his eyes when she was gone, Dean slapping his shoulder.

“Don’t worry, buddy. I’m sure my hyper observant protection agent didn’t catch the way you said that straight to her face and then pretended to say it to your boss.” Eric shrugged him off and grumbled on his way outside, harshly pulling the door behind him. “Damn. I was hoping they’d have some kind of fairytale moment or shit. He looked like he wanted to fuck her over the kitchen table.”

“I don’t know. We’ll just…wait and see what happens,” you said, holding out your hand. “Ready to go?”

“One sec,” he said, reaching into his pocket and pulling something out. He slipped something elastic over your wrist, beaming when you stared down at it to find it was a friendship bracelet, like the kind from when you were kids. This one was black, gray and white, the LA Wolves colors. You turned it over when you felt a few square beads, expecting to see DEAN.

Your heart skipped when you saw MAX with a few beads separating it from SAM. You glanced up Dean, his green eyes flittering down to where he’d removed his jacket, right sleeve pushed up. 

Dean had always had Sam’s initials tattooed on his forearm. You remember that happened at some point in college, not too long after Sam went missing. The initials right below it were new though, his skin tinged a light pink from where the tattoo was still fresh.

“Is that-”

“Max’s initials? Yeah, looks like it,” he said, a coy smile crossing his face. You held out a finger, Dean humming it was alright to touch. A thick swallow was audible as you traced over the delicate skin, black ink soaked into the creamy canvas of his body.

“Fuck you,” you whispered, Dean’s face falling.

“Sweetheart, I’m-” he said as he wiped at your eyes, mascara coming away on the back of your hand. You laughed, shaking your head at him.

“Look what you did you sweet man,” you laughed, a few tears falling free. “Dean, you didn’t have to put his name on your body.”

“Brothers go on the arm. It’s kind of my thing,” he said, your bottom lip wobbling as a swell of emotion hit you. “Are you mad?”

“No,” you croaked out, squeezing your bracelet. “I wish they were with us.”

“Me too,” he said softly, wiping his thumb under your eye, stopping a tear from falling. “Y/N.”

You met his green eyes, thumb stroking your cheek with a barely there touch.

“You understand you’re my girl, right?” You nodded, Dean’s head tilting slightly, eyes scanning down to your lips slowly and back up just as lazily. “So. Am I yours?”

You held a finger to his lips and turned towards the front door, pulling it open, Eric and Sloane both leaned against an SUV.

“We’ll leave in thirty,” you said, pulling the door shut again, finding Dean with a raised eyebrow. “I need ten to fix my makeup. The other twenty is to show you exactly how much you’re mine.”

Dean POV

I stepped outside while Y/N used the bathroom, the brisk air doing wonders for cooling me down after what I could only describe as the most intimate handjob I’d ever received. It was the one thing that stuck out to me about sex with Y/N. Every other partner I’d had, it was about release, pleasure. With Y/N though, it felt different. A good different. Yeah, it was about the pleasure there too but it was…comforting in a way, joined together. 

Once Y/N had let go of her fear of it, intimacy turned out to be one of her favorite things in the world. And it was becoming one of mine too. She just made me feel safe. Whole again.

“Told you she’d cry about the tattoo,” mumbled Eric in my ear, hands clasped behind his back. “Surprised you didn’t get down on one knee yet.”

“We understand what we are to each other,” I said, adjusting the sleeve of my jacket. “The time for that’ll come eventually but I don’t think either one of us is in a rush to get there.”

“Ready!” exclaimed Y/N, rushing outside barefoot, the skirt of her dress bunched up in one hand, heels in the other. “How late are we?”

“Oh, only forty five minutes,” said Eric, Y/N jumping in the backseat when he opened the door. “Clutch?”

“I’m the purse tonight,” I chuckled, patting my pocket where her phone, a lipstick and extra hair tie resided. 

“Good. I usually get stuck with it,” said Eric, patting my bottom. “Let’s move it kiddos.”

“Hopefully this party doesn’t suck,” said Y/N beside me as we drove up a long driveway thirty minutes later, lips pursed.

“You hate parties,” Eric chuckled from the passenger seat.

“I hate parties where people ask me to sing at their kid’s sweet sixteen which is like, almost all the time,” she said, my hand reaching over and interlacing our hands together. “Sorry. That sounded bitchy.”

“It sounded like that’s really annoying to have happen all the time,” I said, the car slowing down behind another luxury SUV. “We won’t stay long, just a few hours. I know we have to do this for me.”

“Hey,” she said, voice firm. My eyes flickered to hers in the dark space. “We both have more money than we know what to do with. I’m perfectly happy to waste an evening if it means sending some of that money to a good cause. You getting some good press out of it is a bonus.”

“I ever tell you how wonderful you are?” I asked, heart swelling up as she blushed. “Want to go show off your reformed bad boy, sweetheart?”

“You were never bad,” she said, pecking a kiss on my lips. She grinned goofily and wiped them off with her thumb. “Lipstick.”

“You can take it off if you promise to put it back later,” I said, Y/N’s eyes flirting down to my groin, a wicked smirk on her face. “Down girl.”

“I’ll play with you later,” I said as we stopped. Eric slid out of the passenger seat as I opened the back door. I exited and held out a hand, helping Y/N down in her obnoxious skinny little heels. They looked like a death trap to me but she danced around on stage for three hours in them so if anyone knew how to work them, it was her.

Damn she was sexy in that dress. Almost as sexy as those red flannel pajama pants she wore last night. And that cozy blue sweater on Thursday. Or that-

“Stop staring at her,” said Sloane, pushing on my back so I’d move and she could slip out of the backseat. “You’re like a puppy obsessed with her.”

“Be nice,” Y/N chided, taking a step forward, letting me follow her lead. Eric and Sloane fell in place behind us, the driver staying with the car and driving off towards where the cars were being parked. 

A man in a nice suit opened the front door for us, revealing a grand hall that made Y/N’s house look like a starter home. 

“This guy is loaded,” I whispered in Y/N’s ear as we found ourselves quickly surrounded by people when they caught sight of her. There must have been three hundred people at this thing.

“Here we go,” she mumbled before putting on a big smile, immediately getting asked to be in a selfie with a woman in her twenties.

For the next thirty minutes it felt like we were bombarded, stuck not ten feet past the door in a never ending line of people wanting to talk to Y/N. Yes, some people were football fans but a vast majority were there for Y/N, some nervous, some practically jumping out of their skins.

“Damn dude, you’re beyond lucky,” said some guy to me as his wife took a picture with Y/N. 

“I know I am,” I responded, Y/N giving me a flash of a smile.

“She needs a break,” whispered Eric in my ear. I stepped forward and cut off the next gaggle of women that wanted to approach. 

“Excuse me, I need to steal Y/N for a minute,” I said, taking her arm and leading her down the large open hall.

“Thanks,” she said, grabbing a glass of champagne off a servers tray. She knocked it back and I started to scan the room in search of water for her.

“Hi,” said a teenage girl in a light blue dress, approaching slowly. She seemed out of place at the event filled with adults in designer clothes. “I’m Cecilia Monroe, Sebastian Monroe’s daughter.”

Ah she was this guys kid. That made sense. “Nice to meet you. We haven’t met your father yet. We’d like to thank him for his numerous donations to the Wolves charity over the years.”

“You have a lovely home,” said Y/N, the girl blushing, clasping her hand over her wrist in a failed attempt to hide her friendship bracelet. Y/N caught it and smiled. “Did you go to the tour this year?”

“Uh yeah. My dad got VIP tickets,” she said shyly, suddenly straightening her back. “I’ll be on the veranda. Please come find me when you’re through with my dad. It’s very important.”

She scuttled away, Y/N raising an eyebrow.

“I think you have a superfan,” I chuckled, Y/N biting her lip. “You think she’s a problem?”

“No. She’s a fan clearly but I don’t know,” she said, waving for Eric and Sloane to join us from where they stood together by a table of appetizers. 

“You two good?” asked Sloane, their eyes finding the young girl and watching her leave.

“Keep an eye on that girl,” Y/N said, nodding as Cecilia went through open back doors outside. They both readied themselves but Y/N shook her head. “Just watch her. This might be a Denver situation.”

“Denver?” I asked, Eric frowning. 

“Fan in Denver was being abused by her parents. Subtly asked Y/N for help at an event. Smart kid actually,” said Eric. “Sloane and I can try a soft approach with the girl, get a feel for if something is up, relay we can keep her safe .”

“This guy does have a lot of private security,” said Sloane. “If something’s happening, she may feel safer knowing we can protect her in the interim.”

“Let’s go talk to the girl,” said Y/N just as a man in a very nice suit came striding down the hall towards us. “I think that’s our host.”

“Eric, Sloane, go see what’s up. We can fend for ourselves for awhile,” I said. They scuttled away as the man greeted us, holding out a hand and shaking mine firmly.

“Sebastian Monroe,” he said with a pleasant enough smile. “And you two are the power couple my teenage daughter will not stop talking about.”

“Yeah, we get that a lot. We said hello to her earlier,” said Y//N with a fake smile, staying close to my side when the men looked like he was going to reach for her hand. “Y/N Y/L/N.”

“Dean Winchester,” I said, taking my hand back, the other wrapped around Y/N’s waist. The man only smiled though, like we didn’t need to introduce ourselves. “I’ve heard you’re a Wolves fan.”

“Oh not anymore than anyone else,” he said with a wave of his hand. “Although a signed jersey by you would certainly go for big bucks at our next charity auction.”

“We’ll have to make that happen for sure,” I said, not enjoying the way his gaze traveled down Y/N’s body. I’d seen it plenty of times tonight but his seemed the most sleazy of all. 

“Speaking of the auction, where are the tables? I’d love to donate,” said Y/N.

“Right side of the veranda, sweetie.” Y/N hummed, giving me a look to join her as soon as I could. “Boy, if I was ten years younger.”

I couldn’t hide my annoyance, Sebastian flashing me a smile. “Oh no. Please go ahead and tell me what you’d do if you were ten years younger.”

“Easy kid. Half the population would bone her if they could,” he said, sipping from the glass in his hand. He took his turn to eye me, a curious look on his face. “You know, I could be inclined to offer another sizeable donation to the Wolves charity for those kids if I could get one of those signed jerseys myself.”

I bit my tongue, both of us aware of the clear message. Refuse and good ol’ Sebastian stops donating a million dollars each year to kids in poverty.

“I’m sure you got one around here somewhere we could fix up,” I said. Sebastian threw an arm over my shoulder and I hide my cringe. 

“Good man. Come on. I got one right in my game room.”

Reader POV

There wasn’t really anything you wanted from the silent auction but you had found a general donation slip at the end of the table and jotted down your agent’s information. You’d looked around for Eric and Sloane or the girl when you finished but hadn’t found any of them which probably wasn’t a good sign. You frowned and walked over the railings edge, looking around the dim yard for any sign of them.

“Bruschetta?” asked one of the servers. 

“No thank you,” you said without looking.

“I must insist,” he said. You rolled your eyes, ready to give it to this guy but something seemed familiar about him. He handed you one on a small napkin as you kept staring. “Take a bite and smile, pretend it’s really good.”

You’d had more than a handful of dangerous fan interactions over the years but this felt…different.

You did as he asked, faking wide eyes at the average at best food. “Who are you?”

“Do not make a scene,” he said as you finished off the food. “I need to get to your bodyguards.”

“Are you trying to protect that girl? Cecilia?” you asked as you played along and took another piece off the tray.

“What? No. I don’t have time for this,” he said, stepping in front of you, your gaze narrowing. “Do not ask questions. Just get me and Max the fuck out of here.”

“Max?” Your heart skipped a beat, the food falling from your hand as you understand where you’d seen him before. “Y-You’re Sam.”

“We’re watched. Get your guards to get us out. Don’t get caught or we’re dead,” he said, turning away and offering a couple nearby food from his tray. You swallowed, instantly putting on your performer’s smile. The one you wore that time you had food poisoning during a concert and were throwing up between songs back in the summer. The crowd had no fucking clue you felt like shit while you gave them the show of their lives.

Time to act your fucking ass off. 

You walked past Sam without a second glance, wishing you could ask him all the questions swirling around in your head. Tell him he was going to be okay. Give him a damn hug and tell him he was safe now.

But you wore that damn smile, all while your blood was boiling. You’d had a lot of dark fantasies about what you’d do to the person that took Max. In recent weeks that’d turned to include Sam too. 

It turned out the monster was a hundred feet away from you inside some fucking mansion.

“Y/N,” said Sloane, appearing through a set of open doors in the house, catching your arm a little roughly. “Stay in public.”

“I need to talk-” She shot daggers at you, shutting you up. 

“Stay in public for the love of god or Eric will kill me,” she said, loosening her grip. “In forty five seconds I need you to be the biggest distraction in the world. Do not go in any rooms with anyone. Your fame will keep you safe but only if there are people around to witness it. Eric has eyes on him. Do not ask questions. Understand?”

“Sam’s on the veranda,” you whispered, Sloane nodding. Cecilia must have told her and Eric about your brothers.

“Go give us a shot to get them out of here.” You nodded and slipped inside, heart thumping away in your throat. Max was with with Eric. Wherever he was, he was with Eric. He was safe. And Sam should have been with Sloane by then. They were both safe.

As long as they got them out of this house and into the damn car before anyone could notice. Before all those private security guards seemingly on the edge of every room could stop them. Your driver was fast though. They just had to get the boys in the car and they’d be alright.

So you needed to be a distraction. A big fucking distraction and buy them time. You froze in the middle of the hallway, watching Sebastian leave a room with Dean by his side, horribly annoyed from the looks of it. An idea sparked in your mind, one you hoped Dean forgave you for someday. 

Yeah, you knew how to cause a big fucking distraction alright.

Dean POV

“You son of a bitch!” screamed Y/N. Normal people could scream loud. A goddamn professional singer that could belt out ballads while running? The whole house went silent at her ear piercing shriek. Even the string orchestra stopped playing. I stared at her as she climbed on top of a table in the center hall, my eyes going wide. “You fucking cheater! You’re a fucking cheater Dean Winchester!”

“Excuse me?” I said, a hundred already with their phones out with even more people piling into the house from the veranda. “Sweetheart-”

“Don’t sweetheart me!” she screamed again. What the fuck was happening? “You’re a cheating bastard! You swore you were different!”

“Y/N, get off the table,” I said gently, very aware of the many phones that were facing us, even some from the freaking staff and private event security. Y/N only backed away when I reached for her, fury in her eyes so visceral it felt like it burned. “Y/N what-”

“I know what you did with her! By the fucking cherry blossoms? Our cherry blossoms? You think you can sleep around on me? I’m the motherfucking Princess of Pop! The world fucking loves me!” 

Something was wrong. Besides the fact I hadn’t cheated, Y/N wasn’t one to scream at people from tabletops. She wasn’t drunk and she wasn’t on drugs. And we had no fucking cherry blossoms. Except for the fact it was the code to get in her house. 

Trust. She was asking me to fucking trust her right now in front of three hundred people while she tore down my reputation.

If my girl was losing her shit, well damn I was going to play right along.

“Oh get off your high fucking horse!” I shouted, Y/N flinching for a brief moment like it’d stung. “I never made you promises. We aren’t even fucking exclusive!”

“What?!” she shouted back as Sebastian came over, clearing his throat.

“Perhaps if you two could-”

“This bitch is a moron for thinking I’d ever want someone like her. Of course I’m dicking around with you! You really think I want some goodie two shoes like you?”

“Man whore!” she shouted.

“Fucking prude!” I screamed back, praying to god Y/N knew that every word out of my mouth was a lie. “No wonder no one wants to date you. Getting in your pants wasn’t even worth it!”

“Funny since getting in yours just takes a smile. I’m surprised you haven’t contracted every disease known to man you pig!”

“At least I get some! You’re wound up so tight surprised anything can fucking fit up there!” Fuck, I was really going to hate myself in the morning.

Y/N was halfway through screaming back at me when I felt both my phone and Y/N’s go off in my pocket.

YOUR BROTHERS ARE SAFE. HOST SECURITY KNOWS WE GOT THEM OUT. OUR SECURITY & FEDS ON THE WAY. ETA TEN MINUTES. DON’T TRUST LOCAL COPS. CORRUPTED. HOST IS BAD GUY. STAY AWAY FROM HIM AND GUARDS. DO WHAT YOU HAVE TO TO STAY IN PUBLIC. 

“What the fuck does brothers safe mean?” I asked, tossing my phone to her. Y/N caught it one handed, her whole body relaxing momentarily before tensing again, her rage suddenly on it’s true target.

Sebastian Monroe.

“Our brothers were here,” she grit out. She ripped off her heels and hopped down onto the floor, stalking over to Sebastian slowly like he was her prey. Her face darkened and I swore she looked ready to tear someone’s throat out. “Our baby brothers were in this fucking house! As your servers! Not of their free will! No. No, they were being watched. Forced. Last I checked, our baby brothers were kidnapped and they didn’t get un-fucking kidnapped.”

She gripped her heel tight in her left hand, right clenched so hard I saw the bone against the skin of her knuckles.

“I don’t care if you weren’t the one that took them. But you kept them and I’m going to fucking destroy you for it,” she growled, approaching him as my brain tried to catch up. 

“Y/N what are-”

“I saw Sam! And he was scared and said they’d kill him if he got caught talking to me. They’re safe now but Sam and Max were forced to live here. By him.” Her head turned towards Sebastian, his own head glancing at his security team. “What the fuck did you do to our brothers?”

It clicked for me what she’d been saying, what the text meant, why Y/N had acted so out of character. So full of hatred. But I barely had a chance to feel that same hatred. 

Because in the blink of an eye, one of Sebastian’s guards grabbed at Y/N and her fist shot out, connecting with the man’s jaw. He seemed alarmed at her strength and fell back, another guard trying to get their hands on her.

“Get off!” she shouted, kneeing another guy before flipping him on his back. But there were too many of them and I rushed forward, yanking her behind me just as Sebastian got in my face.

He eyed me up and down, smirking at me. “Oh you two just made a big mistake.”

He clasped his hands together loudly as his guards surrounded us, turning his attention to the rest of the party.

“Let’s give the love birds some privacy to sort out their issues,” he chuckled. “And maybe keep an eye on the open bar, hm?”

He spun back around and leaned in close, the stench of cigars and alcohol on his breath. 

“Get your brothers back here or I’ll fuck her up so badly there won’t be anything left to bury.” He gripped my shoulder, too forcefully. “And then I’ll bury you alive in the woods all the while the world will think you got in a drunken accident on the way home. After all you had a very loud and public argument tonight. With the friends I have in certain positions of authority…I can make even you two disappear like nothing.”

Y/N gripped the back of my suit jacket tight, a slight tremble in her hand as she listened to him speak.

“Get those boys back and get those guards back in the next ten minutes or I start cutting off pieces of the damn princess of pop.”

________

A/N: Read the Final Part here!

[mrs-stans]

Sebastian Stan Scolds “Hypocrite” Trump at ‘The Apprentice’ U.K. Premiere: “Do You Really Trust This Person to Lead a Country?”

Stan, who portrays Donald Trump in Ali Abbasi's new movie, was asked whether this film debuting so close to the U.S. election could sway voters: "He's been trying to censor this movie, and at the same time, he claims he acknowledges free speech. I can't think of anything more hypocritical."

BY LILY FORD

Sebastian Stan has branded former U.S. president Donald Trump a hypocrite who has attempted to “censor” his new movie, The Apprentice.

The Marvel actor spoke at the BFI London Film Festival premiere of Ali Abbasi’s movie about Trump’s rise to power in 1970s and ’80s New York — in which he stars as the real estate mogul-turned-Republican politician — with the teachings of mentor Roy Cohn (played by Jeremy Strong) guiding him on his ascension.

The cast and crew, including Stan, Strong, Abbasi and screenwriter Gabriel Sherman, appeared on the red carpet at the BFI’s Royal Festival Hall in the U.K. capital.

When asked whether this film debuting so close to the U.S. election could sway voters, Stan told The Hollywood Reporter: “I don’t know, but what I do hope is that people, regardless of their opinion, are curious enough to try to dig deeper. Because I think we’re living in a world where it’s so easy to be handed an opinion everywhere you turn. And I know a lot of people love social media, and that’s where they go for information and for things. You’re being told what to think. You’re being told what to do.”

But, the Marvel star continued, “If you have any inkling of interest, go and really ask yourself: ‘Who is this man? Do you really know? Do you really trust this person to lead a country?’ He’s been trying to censor this movie, and at the same time, he claims that he acknowledges free speech … I can’t think of anything more hypocritical. So at the end of the day, it’s about him as a character. Forget the politics and just go in there and use your instinct and ask yourself: Do you trust this man? That’s what the movie is about.”

The feature film opened in roughly 1,700 theaters across the U.S. last weekend after its debut in Cannes and pulled in an anemic $1.6 million in its first weekend. Trump lashed out against the film after the numbers came in.

“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,” Trump wrote in a post on Truth Social.

Sherman told THR: “It’s not surprising [that Trump lashed out]… You’ve seen the film, the first lesson that Roy Cohn teaches him is: attack, attack, attack. So Trump hasn’t seen the movie, but he’s clearly following the rules that are in the movie.”

Sherman also said part of the inspiration for this film was to show Trump as carrying on Cohn’s legacy, as sources who worked on the 2016 Trump campaign told him the businessman was just “using Roy’s lessons.”

The Apprentice received rave reviews and an 8-minute standing ovation after its Cannes Film Festival premiere in May.

[jokeroutsubs]

📝 ENG Translation: Joker Out honestly on anxiety that is ever-present

Article by evrovizija.com, written by Alesh Maatko, originally published on 7.2.2024.

Joker Out / Photo: Urša Premik

The Song 'Everybody's Waiting' is coming

Just before a big European tour, Joker Out will present a new track, undoubtedly one of their most magnificent songs to date - Everybody's Waiting. This is the band's first release after their temporary move from their native Ljubljana to London, where they were driven by the desire to create a new album. Everybody's Waiting focuses on personal thoughts and reflections that accompany many young people these days. The premiere of Joker Out's new single will take place on Friday, the 16th of February.

Joker Out on Anxiety

The song Everybody's Waiting grew out of Bojan's sudden bouts of anxiety on stage and in everyday life. In an increasingly fast-paced society driven by success and individualism, anxiety is now, unstoppably, on the rise, but it still seems to be somehow overlooked and ignored. A song can act as a valve that offers the listener the opportunity to recognise himself as the main protagonist of the story, recognise his own feelings and release the tension.

The song was written last summer, when the band was recording the song Sunny Side of London in the Beatracks studio in Kočevje. It was produced by their longtime producer Žarko Pak, the mix was created by Sebastian Krys, and the final sound was provided by Maor Appelbaum. In the music video, which will also be premiered on the 16th of February, we will be able to follow the story of the protagonist, who struggles with his inner battles in the comfort of his own house, while the band, almost like an apparition, pours out its soul through its instruments around him. The video highlights the deep introspective nature of the song, while hinting at the role of music and art in overcoming personal challenges. Bojan took care of the direction in tandem with the long-time collaborator of the band, Mark Pirc.

Slovenija 2023: Joker Out – Carpe Diem | Photo: Sarah Louise Bennett / EBU

The 'See You Soon' Tour

The new single comes two weeks before the start of the big European tour 'See You Soon', which takes the band to as many as 13 countries, including France, Belgium and Italy for the first time. It promises 22 concerts at some of the world's most iconic venues, including the O2 Shepherd's Bush Empire. The dates of some festival concerts are also known, including EXIT (July 10-14, Novi Sad), Sziget (August 7-12, Budapest) and Sea Star (May 23-26, Umag).

At the end of last year, Joker Out also released the album and concert film 'Live From Arena Stožice', which was created at their revolutionary concert in Ljubljana's Arena Stožice, in front of 12,000 fans. The album can be found on all music streaming platforms and an exclusive concert film directed by Mark Pirc is available on demand on the band's website.

The unique concert in Stožice that is still making waves. | Photo: Vita Orehek

With photos by Urša Premik, Sarah Louise Bennett / EBU, and Vita Orehek.

Translation by vessyvk, reviewed by @kurooscoffee, proofeead by IG GBoleyn123

If you repost quotes from the interview, please link back to this post! And if you repost the photos, do not crop out the photographer credit.

[mermaidsirennikita]

ARC REVIEW: You Should Be So Lucky by Cat Sebastian

4.25/5. Releases 5/7/24.

Vibes: New Yooooork, romance so sweet you have to smile, love after loss, and like... I don't know how to put this... the feeling Bull Durham gives me but gay and less toxically masculine?

Heat Index: 4/10

Reporter Mark Bailey doesn't want to cover baseball, and he especially doesn't want to cover Eddie O'Leary, a former rising star who's been playing the worst ball of his life. But it may be better than staying at home and mourning the partner he never got to claim while he was alive. Eddie, on the other hand, is a bit perturbed about giving a personalized account of his current losses to an apparent snob. But as they travel around New York together, Mark finds himself giving some of his own story to Eddie... and falling in love in the process. It's impossible for Eddie to be out, and Mark doesn't want to be someone's secret again--what could their future possibly be?

I love Cat Sebastian, and this book gives me what I want from her: humor, swoony romance, and a richly described, fleshed out world. I've been really impressed by her ability to weave in a setting that really doesn't have a strong "background" in historical romance--midcentury NYC. The way she writes it feels both nostalgic and tangible; and it's not easy for historical romance authors to step out of the settings readers are more used to (Regency, Victorian).

There's something cozy and wry to the way Eddie and Mark fall in love, and I frankly adored their contrasting personalities. Young, somewhat bewildered Eddie, trying his fucking best all the time. Picky, somewhat pretentious, jaded Mark--just unable to stop himself from falling for Eddie's puppyish eagerness.

If you loved We Could Be So Good, you'll love this. If you're less familiar with Sebastian, I suspect you will, too.

Quick Takes:

--There's a rich history of baseball movies, right? Many of which are enjoyed by people who don't get baseball. As referenced above, I personally love Bull Durham (even if the stars are............................... hmm). I have no idea what goes on during baseball, but I do. This book works similarly. You can tell Sebastian knows what she's talking about, you don't have to understand baseball to get the book. It's portrayed in that kind of shorthand that's really about creating a vibe and a setting for the love story, which is so smart.

--I loved the way Mark's grief was depicted. It's arguably harder for him to move on with his life because so few people know that he is grieving, that he did lose his partner. And it's not treated as something that has to compete with his new love for Eddie, and it's not treated like something that's just going to magically go away. It's always going to be there; and it can exist beside his love for Eddie without invalidating it.

I find that a lot of romance novels involving widows and widowers downplay the previous spouse, and I get that. It's difficult to tell a love story that could be accidentally overshadowed by a previous one. However, that can be a little repetitive for me, and it was nice to read a book in which the romance was so tender and so REAL and so centered (there isn't much PLOT PLOT here--it's two people falling in love, there ya go) that also acknowledged that there was another tender and real love story beforehand. Plus, Eddie's understanding and lack of insecurity makes him even more lovable.

--In a lot of ways, this book is low stakes. It's mostly character, there isn't a lot of drama in the romance, they get along, and so forth. However, on the other hand... it does have very high stakes, right? Eddie cannot be a successful professional athlete while being out. Mark, who's kind of quietly out (and works at a newspaper that is pretty much aware of this and okay with it, through some stuff that has to do with WCBSG) understandably doesn't want to be hidden in the shadows. How do we address that?

Personally, I really liked how Sebastian did it. Balancing realism and romance is challenging, and I think she handled this without sacrificing either aspect.

--Ooooh I love people falling in love without realizing it, and damn, Mark does that. But you as the reader also kind of slip into them being in love, too. It feels totally natural. There's a real "that's the summer I fell in love" to this one, and I don't really know if that's going to make sense to a lot of people, but it does to ME.

The Sex:

The door isn't CLOSED, but it's kinda close to being there. You know exactly what's happening, and there are several scenes, but it's all sort of... implied. Even though you're there with them. It's all very romantic (and kind of titillating at points--it's so fun to see Eddie and Mark talk around sex and then get very blunt about it at points) but I would be lying if I said I didn't miss the heat level Sebastian wrote in The Queer Principles of Kit Webb. It's not ridiculous level of heat, it's just a bit more explicit.

Read this and get lulled into love--while also kind of wanting a hot dog? (Literally, not figuratively.) And to walk down a sidewalk in a sort of warm and nonexistent yet also very existent New York City? Talking to someone you're falling for, knowing that they're falling for you, while imagining kissing their mouth?

It's that sensibility.

Thanks to NetGalley and Avon for providing me with a copy of this book. All thoughts and opinions are my own.

[thespaceformyself]

Sebastian

It may not be within the usual thing for everyday people but for me, this movie is fair in rating. On a good note, I like the shape of his face as it is superbly gorgeous, he reminds me of one actor who is outstanding in his nature of artistry and that is Timothee Chalamet.

This movie entitled Sebastian took away my grumpy state of frustration from episode 2 of Brilliant Minds. I am recommending this movie as the lead interests me much in this film, I googled his name and he is Ruaridh Silvio James MacGillivray-Mollica, a Scottish-Italian actor, writer, and director who is slender but sexy.

The formula that is being introduced when it comes to gay films and movies is something that is not new in nature but to see that such movies are on the rise as I am fond of supporting them by watching and giving feedback and reviews is something that I am grateful for especially at this stage of my life that I am not doing much yet and not employed.

It is also creatively fun to watch these types of movies as they package how gay men give and provide love and passion for what they do, not just through making love but through how defining soulful passion means in such content.

Overall for me, this is a fairly good film I may not be fond of older men with white hair, white beard and white moustache nor a character that does much of substance sniffs, but loving the lead for the "debut film" of his. We just need to remember that such an intense process of writing needs a high form of composition and a straight set of discipline it should be more than what you write for and that is harder than what was shown in this film. Great work still. I like the POV for it.

#findingmysolace #thespaceformyself

[steelbluehome]

"The two leads are fantastic: Stan navigates from naïve wannabe to glowering mogul and never loses his way or slips into parody. His vanity about his hair and his looks is on display from the beginning, but in the early years he is unsure of himself and there is a vulnerability about him. Strong is also utterly believable as Cohn, a man as vain as his disciple and certainly as dangerous."

The Standard

The Apprentice review: Sebastian Stan shines in drama about how Donald Trump went from wannabe to mogul (click for article)

This origin story does an excellent job of showing the rise and rise of Donald Trump

Jo-Ann Titmarsh

4 out of 5 stars

One of the hottest tickets in Cannes this year is Iranian director Ali Abbasi’s The Apprentice, his tale of the rise and rise of Donald Trump.

The apprentice in question is Trump himself (Sebastian Stan), while the master he serves and later usurps is Roy Cohn (Jeremy Strong), a lawyer who hobnobs with leaders and has the ear of the president.

Cohn is ruthless and will stop at nothing to attain what he wants, often in the name of a patriotism which equals hard-right conservatism.

The film opens in 1970s New York. Donald is a baby-faced teetotal rent collector for his dad, but he yearns to break free of his father’s grip and strive for greater things, obsessing over the tycoons and millionaires that frequent Le Club.

This is where he meets Cohn who takes Trump under his wing and instructs him to follow his three essential tenets, which are all about achieving, denial and how even a defeat can be turned into a win.

Abbasi deftly recreates the feel of the city and the darkness of those years. And what starts gritty becomes colourful once Ivana (Maria Bakalova) appears her platinum blonde hair, scarlet dress and matching glossy lips.

The other important people are his family members. Martin Donovan plays Fred, the abusive and monstrous family patriarch. Donald’s mother Mary (Iona Rose MacKay) is a less forceful presence, while Trump’s brother Freddy (Charlie Carrick) is sympathetically depicted as a man slowly but irrevocably broken by his father’s contempt.

As the film moves into the 1980s, the look changes completely as the Eighties vibe comes clearly into focus, like walking into the neon-lit bathroom of a dingy club.

There is nothing but tackiness here, that harsh lighting revealing the deals in Atlantic City, the over-the-top décor of the Trump home and the gaudiness of the couple’s life together, even as their relationship falls apart.

The harshness also highlights Trump’s ascension as Cohn begins to falter and the apprentice becomes the master.

The film ends with Trump drafting his book The Art of the Deal, in which he dictates those three tenets drummed into him by Cohn. Nothing about Trump is original. Nothing has been gained by him alone. And there is nothing he won’t do to get what he wants.

The two leads are fantastic: Stan navigates from naïve wannabe to glowering mogul and never loses his way or slips into parody. His vanity about his hair and his looks is on display from the beginning, but in the early years he is unsure of himself and there is a vulnerability about him. Strong is also utterly believable as Cohn, a man as vain as his disciple and certainly as dangerous.

It’s hard not to bring up comparisons with Succession here: a New York dynasty, a tyrannical father, the wealthy elite, the presence of Jeremy Strong who played Kendall Roy… there’s even a fleeting glimpse and mention of Rupert Murdoch, whom Cohn says Trump should cosy up to. And then there’s the excellent music by Martin Dirkov, which has echoes of the Succession theme.

There are some problems, the story is too linear and the screenplay, by Gabriel Sherman, full of scenes seen many times before, such as Cohn chasing after Trump in the street begging for an audience or Donald refusing his calls, and the director could have been more inventive in the fil. However, there is a lot of humour here, particularly thanks to the character of Cohn, and almost always at Trump’s expense.

The Apprentice is not going to change anyone’s mind about Trump, who is so vain that he will almost certainly love this film, despite the references to his plastic surgery and big butt.

But Abbasi does an excellent job of showing us how and why Trump became the Trump of today and how his path to presidency was paved.

[georgiapeach30513]

All I have to say is, she couldn’t support him in person at Sundance? It was 2 hours away and she was trolling from her stairwell. But once he got glowing reviews (as his fine ass should) she posts a supportive message, and hops multiple transatlantic flights to “support him”. Nah, that dog don’t hunt and smells like shit. She literally shit herself in the foot by wait this long to “support him” cause now she’s just a clout chaser who doesn’t mind supporting him now that he’s 2025 Oscar bait.

And Sebastian’s star will continue to rise. I still won’t forgive her for that stupid damn shoe 🤦🏻‍♀️ what was she thinking?? We don’t do that. But she’s always been a bit of a clout chaser. Her boyfriends have always been more famous.

[whatyourusherthinks]

The Apprentice Review

OH GOOD ROAN! AN EXCUSE FOR YOU TO GET POLITICAL. Good lord, can't you go a single review without pushing an agenda on your audience? Go on. Tell us how much you think Trump is destroying America! Tell us about how he's a crook, how he lost both elections he ran in, how he sent a mob to go kill his first vice president! I know you have a grudge against THE GREATEST PRESIDENT EVER! ...Actually Buggnutz. I'm not going to do any of that. I'm just gonna share a Tweet the big man himself made about the movie.

TL;DR, if you didn't laugh at least 3 times reading that, you will not like this movie.

What's The Movie About?

Donald Trump and, more specifically, his relationship with Roy Cohn as he rises... I don't want to say to the top, I guess he rises in prominence in the public eye.

What I Like.

God this movie is really damn good. The cinematography is so much fun. It's a purposeful old-school style, complete with film grain and I really like the hand style. It feels almost like an invisible man following Trump around filming all his private conversations and interactions. They do a really good job replicating old interviews the Donald did in the 70s and 80s, and it melds into the movie to make this time capsule of New York in the past. The amount of sleaze and corruption that penetrates the scenes is honestly delightful. And this is gonna sound weird, but I feel like the movie is actually balance its depiction of Donald. I mean, yeah, they come out on the side of him being a corrupt bastard driven by his ego, but the movie takes the time to show us Trump's descent. You understand why he acts the way he does. You see the change from pathetic wannabe to egotistical blowhard. The movie isn't afraid to show a more respectable side to Donald though. It's a point that they establish Trumps distaste for alcohol and how he doesn't drink. The scene where Donald finds out about his brother's death is so fascinating. It seems almost impossible to make a character in mourning unlikable, but this movie pulls it off. The acting is great. There is so much subtle moments, looks, turns of phrases that covey the storytelling. Sebastian Stan is pitch perfect for early Trump, and even though he doesn't really look the part for late stage Trump, his mannerisms and speech pattern are honestly the best imitation of El Presidente I've ever seen. Jeremy Strong is great as well, and shout out to the guy playing Fred Trump. That guy looks EXACTLY like him. I like the story. I like that it's not afraid to get weird and dark at places. I guess if I'm to be "fair and balanced" I should admit that I don't know if the events of this movie are true. But they feel REALLY TRUE. (For the most part, see down below.) Maybe I'm biased, but c'mon. You telling me Eric's consummation was consensual. What the fuck Roan? Watch the movie, you'll get what I'm saying. And the ending. Holy shit. The ending is powerful. I'm obviously not going to give it away, but the subtle acting, everyone's behaviors, the dichotomy of imagery and events. I was honestly shaken. It was like watching Cthulhu rise from the Pacific Ocean, a terrible beast that hinting at and built up through out the entire story finally revealing itself, reaching down crush you.

What I Didn't Like.

I can't really fault the movie for this, but it's kinda hard to watch something where every main character is a horrific asshole. It wears you down, not being able to root for anyone. And there's like two scenes that definitely did not happen. One is the scene where a guy comes to talk about Trump running for office in the 80s. Like sure. Reagan TOTALLY had Make America Great Again as one of his slogans that he dropped. And when Trump Tower opens, Fred Trump tells Donald that he did a good job. I think everyone know that didn't fucking happen.

Final Summation.

Of course you liked it you TRAITOR TO AMERICA!

...I legitimately hate you. Yeah I know.

[desertsongpdf]

VIDEO ESSAYS (part ??? 1/2) [parts: 1 / 2 / 3 / 3.5 / 4 / 5 / 6], *=personal fav

ronald reagan & the biggest failure in physics (1) / george bush vomited & set physics back by a decade (2) / bill clinton & the day physics died (3)

the man who almost faked his way to a nobel prize (1) / suspicions are swirling and bell labs is burning (2)

the man who tried to fake an element

air: an honest review

what if you put your head in a particle accelerator

the most successful scientific theory ever: the standard model

the five kinds of paradox

disney channel's theme: a history mystery*

music theory and white supremacy*

the power of nostalgic music

we tracked what happens after tiktok songs go viral

why spotify playlists never truly shuffle

will toledo and the rise of car seat headrest

kid a: the greatest left turn in music history

how trailer music tricks you

why steve lacy is annoyed.

the postmodern horror of tiktok's encanto discourse*

the queer history of weimar germany

queerbaiting celebrities: an over analysis*

why queer relationship dynamics are harder: the stable marrige problem

queer rage & the christian right

overanalyzing the barbie movies with a queer marxist theory

the gay appeal of toxic love

queering cinema (by any means necessary)

the tragedy of being rich

what the internet did to garfield*

your college essay didn't get you accepted, you're just rich

why are you so angry? part 1: a short history of anita sarkeesian / part 2: angry jack / part 3: perception is everything / part 4: an autopsy on gamergate / part 5: 'the good guy' / part 6: talking to angry jack

the modern diogenes: a guide to slavoj zizek

stimulating alternate voting systems

men are miserable: tiktok's depression pipeline

the broken mythology of great men

so you're having an existential crisis

why is gen z humor so weird?

how to be correct about everything all the time

useful idiots and the groomer panic

why extinction loves the ugly - the 'cute' defence

paris saint-germain: a legacy of failure

why did sebastian vettel get called out on national tv?

an introduction to match fixing in football

the debacle of blue clay: used once and never again

atticus is everything wrong with modern poetry*

how the publishing industry failed 'lolita' (as told by terrible book covers)

the death of the teen fantasy era

recreating the fashion of my immortal

hijacking the dead? terry prachett & the trans 'debate'

this best-selling novel was a total hoax

the little book of cosmic horrors

the absurd 2nd century space opera you'll never read

fantasy is very pro-monarchy (and that's weird)

anti-smoking campaigns on tiktok

why did our brains shrink

the origins of the anti-christ

world war one performance tier list

the psychology behind conspiracy theories

why are there two a's?

i fixed the alphabet / i fixed the alphabet more

hangman is a weird game

the curious history of ignorant tattoos

the arguments for god's existance tier list

projecting 'boris is a wet wipe' on houses of parliment

buddhism is kinda out there, man

mortis - internet mysteries

the universe iceberg explained

reviewing every mental illness

[cryingoflot49]

Book Review

Counter-Clock World by Philip K. Dick

Life is uncertain. Our perceptions of reality are shaky, incomplete, distorted, and inaccurate. If we use our perceptions of truth as a basis for making decisions and plans of action, how can we possibly know if we are doing the right thing or not? We can’t so we just do what we think is right and hope it works out for the best. This is the central, unstated theme of Philip K. Dick’s Counter-Clock World.

Sebastian Hermes is at the center of it all. He lives in a future time when dead people reawaken and rise from their graves and after being reborn they get younger with the passage of time, eventually becoming children then infants and returning to the womb. Sebastian runs a business, assisting people as they return to life then selling them to whoever will be their caretaker for the immediate future. One night while working in a graveyard, he realizes that the leader of a religious cult called the Uditi, named the Anarch Peak, is about to come back to life. Sebastian realizes this is an opportunity to make a huge amount of money, so he helps to resurrect the Anarch Peak, but not everything works out as smoothly as he plans.

The antagonist of the story is the Library which is run by a secretive group called the Erads. Their mission is the control of information and they operate by erasing and destroying all works of literature that they decide are harmful for society. They realize that the Anarch Peak is about to return, so they hatch a plot to kidnap and assassinate him before he can spread his religious message further than it already has. They know his return will be even more important this time because during death he would have had direct contact with God. The Erads send a charming and beautiful woman named Ann Fisher to seduce Sebastian Hermes while an attempt on the Anarch Peak’s life is made since he is being held in the care of Sebastian’s office building. Ann Fisher’s plans get spoiled because two secret agents from Rome tip Sebastian off to her plot. These Romans are most likely unstated representatives of the Catholic church who have a vested interest in getting a hold of the Anarch Peak.

At this point in the book, it becomes obvious that this is an action/thriller story with science-fiction trappings and theological undertones. Since the world moves in reverse, people disgorge food rather than eating it and they blow smoke into cigarette butts which elongate until they can be put into a pack. The climax of sex happens when the male’s sperm separates from the egg and returns to the man. There are other science-fiction details like flying cars, robot people, and exotic high-tech weaponry. None of this feeds directly into the main point. The author wanted to write a story about resurrection and made time flow in reverse, then added these details in to make it feel more complete and maybe a little more trippy like some mind-blowing window decorations. This was written in the late 1960s after all. These details, aside from the dead returning to life, are more or less just gimmicks. But at least they are unique and interesting gimmicks. The theological conversations and meditations on the nature of time and mortality are not terribly original either and seem to be tacked onto the story to give it a more mystical atmosphere.

As the story progresses, the actual theme of the book becomes a little less obscure. That theme, being the uncertainty of our perceptions and the inability to understand the consequences of our actions, can be seen in how the action unfolds. While there are a lot of sub-themes throughout, one thing becomes clear: Sebastian is faced with a series of choices in which the uncertainty of the outcomes make it difficult to judge what the right plan of action should be. This can be seen in his attempts to negotiate with the Romans and the Uditi who both want him to turn the Anarch Peak over to them. This culminates in Sebastian’s attempt to rescue the Anarch Peak and his wife Lotta from the fortress-like Library which is held by the Erads. It seems that whatever he does in this situation, it will be the wrong thing from both a personal and a moral point of view.

To confuse matters more, Sebastian Hermes begins having dreams and vision in which the Anarch Peak visits him as a spirit and gives him information and instructions. Sebastian has no way of knowing if these are real or hallucinatory, but the Anarch Peak gives him one significant piece of information. He tells Sebastian that he is the most important man in the world. At this point, you can not tell if Sebastian is losing his mind or not. It appears that world events of religious and historical importance are happening all around him and maybe he is some sort of Christ-like figure that has been chosen as a messenger for God. But maybe this is all a delusional compensation for the way he keeps digging himself deeper and deeper into trouble by making decisions that are morally and pragmatically of a dubious nature. He may be somebody with a divine purpose or he may be a complete loser having delusions of grandeur to save his fragile mind from sinking into self-destruction.

What is truly great about this book is the way you see this whole mess from Sebastian Hermes’ point of view. His confusion becomes your confusion and the fact that, despite all his screw ups, he remains a sympathetic character to the end because he is motivated entirely by pure intentions and honesty. What are the ethics of this? Do insanity and honesty cancel each other out? If Sebastian isn’t insane, do his failures cancel out his purity of intent? The story leaves you hanging without any clear answers.

As enjoyable as this book can be, it isn’t one of Philip K. Dick’s major works. The biggest flaw of the book is the inconsistencies of the time-in-reverse premise. While food is disgorged and cigarettes are un-smoked, bullets don’t fly out of people’s bodies and back into guns. The flying cars move forward. People don’t run or walk in reverse. Even worse, when people get shot or blown uo they don’t return to life the way people in their graves do. And how could the plot even move forwards in a world where everything goes backwards? Why can’t the characters even predict what is going to happen next? If you think about this too much you will ruin the experience of the story. It is just better to accept these flaws without dwelling on them too deeply. You actually have to do that if you expect to take anything away from the story.

The idea that we can never know what is real with any certainty and therefore can never know what to do with any certainty is the same theme that animates Philip K. Dick’s earlier novel The Man In the High Castle. He just transplants that idea into a totally different setting and plot line. Counter-Clock World is also a lot more entertaining. The way you can feel Sebastian’s confusion while he maintains a calm and certain exterior is a strong point and the story moves along nicely too, even if the main theme is obscured under all the details. This isn’t one of Philip K. Dick’s most popular novels, but it possibly is his more underrated.

[mlleclaudine]

Born into slavery, he rose to the top of France’s art world

by Sebastian Smee - The Washington Post, July 12, 2024

Guillaume Lethière’s epic life is the subject of a stunning new exhibition, in the U.S. before it travels to the Louvre.

Guillaume Lethière, “Woman Leaning on a Portfolio,” circa 1799. (Frank E. Graham/Worcester Art Museum/Bridgeman Images)

WILLIAMSTOWN, Mass. — During the most tumultuous period in France’s modern history, Guillaume Lethière was one of its most venerated artists. His story is epic. Charles Dickens or Alexandre Dumas (who delivered a eulogy at Lethière’s funeral) would have struggled to make it sound credible. Pity me, your poor reviewer.

He was the third child (“Le Thière” is French for “the third”) of an enslaved, mixed-race woman and a White plantation owner. Today, his paintings — some of them cinematic in scale — can be found in museums in the United States and Europe, including the Louvre, and also in Port-au-Prince, Haiti. Among his smaller works is one of the most tender and beautiful portraits I know.

Don’t feel bad if you’ve never heard of him. But be aware that in Guadeloupe, where he was born in 1760, Lethière has long been celebrated. According to Esther Bell, the curator of an extraordinary new exhibition about Lethière, there is an auto-body repair shop in the coastal town of Sainte-Anne bearing the name “Guillaume Lethière.” Nearby, in the center of a busy rotary in the French neighborhood — previously the site of the plantation whereLethière grew up — is a huge steel sculpture in the shape of an artist’s palette alongside two enormous paintbrushes. Shapes cut out of the steel reveal the face of Lethière as he looked in an 1815 drawing by his pupil, the great neoclassical artist Jean-Auguste-Dominique Ingres.

This summer, you might see Lethière’s loveliest portrait (scholars think it probably depicts his stepdaughter, Eugénie Servières, herself an accomplished artist) blown up on highway billboards advertising “Guillaume Lethière” at the Clark Art Institute in Williamstown, Mass., through Oct. 14. The exhibition will travel to the Louvre in November.

Guillaume Lethière, “Lafayette Introducing Louis-Philippe to the People of Paris,” 1830-1831. (Tokyo Fuji Art Museum/Bridgeman Images)

Researched and developed over many years by Bell, the Clark’s deputy director and chief curator, with Olivier Meslay, the museum’s director, and accompanied by a 432-page catalogue, the exhibition tells the story of Lethière’s improbable life.

To understand his significance, it’s not enough just to look at his paintings and drawings — although these are very good and earned him accolades aplenty during his lifetime. You need to consider his own complicated proximity to the world-historical events through which he lived.

Born into slavery (or so it’s assumed, given his parentage and the telling absence of baptismal records), Lethière was brought to France by his father, the French king’s public prosecutor in Guadeloupe, in 1774, when he was 14. He began training as an artist in Rouen. Thanks to his father’s influence, he was already close to serious power by his late teens.

Guillaume Lethière, “Académie,” 1782 (Beaux-Arts de Paris/RMN-Grand Palais/Art Resource, New York)

But of course, staying close to power is not easy when the personnel keeps changing. Like others of his generation, Lethière had to steer a course through the last days of the Ancien Régime, the French Revolution, the Terror, the rise of Napoleon Bonaparte, European conquest, imperial collapse, a brief Bonapartist revival, a restored monarchy, and finally, just before Lethière’s death in 1832, a constitutional monarchy.

What makes him uniquely interesting is that he managed all this while also navigating the shifting implications of his illegitimate, mixed-race origins in Guadeloupe.

Lethière was neither smarmy nor sycophantic, but he knew how to ingratiate himself to others. He “won the esteem and friendship of everyone by his honesty, his politeness, and a frank and loyal character that never wavered,” wrote Francois-Guillaume Ménageot, the director of the French Academy.

Alexandre Clément, after Louis-Léopold Boilly, “Reunion of Artists,” 1804. Guillaume Lethière is shown at center. (Clark Art Institute)

Lethière and his mother, Marie-Françoise Pepeye, were both emancipated by his father, Pierre Guillon. But it was many years before changes to the law allowed Guillon to recognize Lethière as his son. Lethière and his sister were named as Guillon’s heirs around the time Napoleon seized power in 1799.

Even so, years later, Lethière had to defend himself against an embarrassing challenge by a distant cousin, who claimed he was the rightful heir. This was in 1819, when the artist was at the height of his renown. The courts eventually found in Lethière’s favor — but not before humiliating references in the press to the esteemed painter’s “naive and modest genealogy.”

Louis-Léopold Boilly, “Guillaume Lethière and Carle Vernet” circa 1798. (Stéphane Maréchal/Palais des Beaux-Arts de Lille/RMN-Grand Palais/Art Resource, New York)

Moral and political complexities choked almost every aspect of Lethière’s life. There’s no doubt, for instance, that he was an abolitionist. And yet he benefited financially from his father’s plantation, which depended on enslaved labor.

Although Lethière never returned to the Caribbean, he cared deeply about the fate of its people. He supported the revolution in Haiti, which began in 1791, just before the French monarchy was abolished, and welcomed the French government’s decision, in 1794, to end slavery in all its territories.

When, eight years later, Napoleon reinstated slavery in the colonies, brutally suppressing an attempt at resistance in Guadeloupe, Lethière was surely disappointed. But by now he was in with the Bonapartes. He painted portraits of, among others, Napoleon’s Caribbean-born wife, the Empress Joséphine, and hitched his fortunes to Lucien Bonaparte, Napoleon’s brother.

Guillaume Lethière, “Joséphine, Empress of the French,” 1807. (Franck Raux/Musée national des châteaux de Versailles et de Trianon/RMN-Grand Palais/Art Resource, New York)

In 1807, Lethière’s friendship with Lucien Bonaparte led directly to his appointment as director of the French Academy in Rome — an immensely prestigious post. There he reinvigorated the academy andoversaw the training of dozens of France’s best artists — among them Ingres, who made a series of stunning drawings of Lethière’s family (included in the show), and a female pupil, Antoinette Cécile Hortense Lescot, who went on to exhibit more than 100 paintings in the Paris Salon.

Ancient Rome was of intense interest not only to France’s revolutionaries, who looked to republican Rome as a model, but also to Napoleon, who of course saw more upside for himself in Rome’s imperial period. Art played a huge role in establishing these lines of pedigree.

Guillaume Lethière, “Brutus Condemning His Sons to Death,” circa 1788. (Clark Art Institute)

The French Revolution had broken out while Lethière was a student at the same academy in Rome. At the time, inspired by his environs, he worked on a major canvas, “Brutus Condemning His Sons to Death.” In a carefully structured, frieze-like composition, he depicted the founder of the Roman republic, Lucius Junius Brutus, looking on stoically as his sons, who had plotted to restore a monarchy, are decapitated.

Lethière returned repeatedly to this subject and to another episode from ancient Rome, “The Death of Virginia.” We can perhaps imagine the painting’s special significance for him when we understand that its subject — a father killing his daughter, at her own request — hinges on the dishonor of being enslaved.

Guillaume Lethière, “The Death of Virginia,” circa 1823-1828. (Rebecca Vera-Martinez/ J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles)

Versions of both paintings enjoyed great success when they were exhibited in Rome and London. But in Paris, tastes were changing, and by the 19th century’s second decade, romanticism was on the rise. Lethière’s neoclassical style began to fall out of favor.

Winning the 1819 inheritance case seems to have inspired Lethière to turn his attention back to the Caribbean, and in 1822 he painted one of his most audacious canvases — an enormous (approximately 11 by 7 feet) painting owned by the Musée du Panthéon National Haitien in Port-au-Prince. It shows two generals, one mixed-race and the other Black, swearing an oath to fight together for the freedom and independence of the people of Saint-Domingue (now Haiti).

Guillaume Lethière, “Oath of the Ancestors,” 1822. (Gérard Blot/Musée du Panthéon National Haïtien, Port-au-Prince)

After a risky and clandestine sea voyage, Lethière’s son personally delivered the painting to Haiti’s President Jean-Pierre Boyer in Port-au-Prince. Two years later, France’s Charles X grudgingly recognized Haiti — but only in return for an indemnity payment that would cripple the young nation for decades.

Unfortunately, the recent civil strife in Haiti has prevented the painting from traveling to the United States. Lethière himself intended the painting for a Haitian audience and, according to Bell, who has tastefully installed a reproduction of it in the exhibition, it “encapsulates Lethière’s fidelity to his place of origin.”

The Clark show immerses us in several decades of political tumult that continue to reverberate today. It has much to say about other French artists and writers with ties to the Caribbean. So it is much more than just a monographic exhibition. For all the stately arrangement of the Clark’s galleries and the superficial stiffness of Lethière’s neoclassical style, the exhibit is like a pinwheeling firecracker, blazing out light, knowledge and cultural energy, and deepening our understanding of a remarkable inheritance.

Guillaume Lethière Through Oct. 14 at the Clark Art Institute in Williamstown, Mass., and then at the Louvre in Paris from Nov. 13 through Feb. 17. clarkart.edu.

[bookaddict24-7]

RECO OF THE WEEK!

Bringing Down the Duke by Evie Dunmore

Synopsis:

"England, 1879. Annabelle Archer, the brilliant but destitute daughter of a country vicar, has earned herself a place among the first cohort of female students at the renowned University of Oxford. In return for her scholarship, she must support the rising women's suffrage movement. Her charge: recruit men of influence to champion their cause. Her target: Sebastian Devereux, the cold and calculating Duke of Montgomery who steers Britain's politics at the Queen's command. Her challenge: not to give in to the powerful attraction she can't deny for the man who opposes everything she stands for.

Sebastian is appalled to find a suffragist squad has infiltrated his ducal home, but the real threat is his impossible feelings for green-eyed beauty Annabelle. He is looking for a wife of equal standing to secure the legacy he has worked so hard to rebuild, not an outspoken commoner who could never be his duchess. But he wouldn't be the greatest strategist of the Kingdom if he couldn't claim this alluring bluestocking without the promise of a ring... or could he?

Locked in a battle with rising passion and a will matching her own, Annabelle will learn just what it takes to topple a duke...."

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I didn't end up reviewing this book, but I remember loving the romance and the badass women and their friendships. If you love historical romance with some pretty impressive women, then you might love this one!

Add this book to your TBR on Goodreads here.

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Have you read this book? Would you recommend it?

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Happy reading!

[triviareads]

ARC Review of You Should Be So Lucky by Cat Sebastian

Rating: 4/5 Heat Level: 3/5 Publication Date: May 7th

Premise:

A queer midcentury romance set in the 1960s; Mark Bailey is assigned to do a series of interviews with Eddie O'Leary, once a rising star in baseball and now contending with an infamous batting slump.

My review:

Cat Sebastian wrote yet another beautifully tender love story where all these little moments add up in a way that never fails to tug at my heartstrings. And I don't say that lightly.

Mark is a prickly reporter for the Arts and Culture section of the Chronicle who somehow gets assigned to do a profile on Eddie O'Leary, Midwestern transplant, once-wunderkind, now in the middle of a months-long batting slump. Eddie is brash and charming and often acts before thinking, but he's so endearing that you can't help but root for him, just like all of New York City, and eventually Mark too.

So, a lot of the book is about Eddie's batting slump, but it isn't the main plot, per say. Cat Sebastian draws these intricate portraits of a handful of characters that give you the sense that these people are a work in progress even when the book is finished— just like people in real life. You really feel the full extent of Mark's loneliness after his partner passed away the year prior, his conflicting feelings about being treated like a dirty secret even as they loved one another, and his inability to mourn openly— Mark's shock when an old mentor at the Chronicle likens Mark's grief to his own when his wife passed is palpable, and that hit me hard.

What I like about Eddie is that he may be quick to jump into a fight or trash talk a team, and he has an almost ridiculous sense of optimism, but he's never portrayed as naive, despite his age (twenty-two!!) and whatever his teammates and even Mark initially assume. He knows his own mind and actually ends up pushing for his and Mark's relationship when Mark is unsure about his own heart, and worried for Eddie's career prospects.

Emotionally, this book feels like a slow-burn because Mark isn't willing to go all-in the way you get the sense Eddie is ready to much sooner. But this is one of those cases where actions speak louder than words and you see it in these little moments of domesticity like when Eddie buys Mark breakfast and they walk the dog together, and how Eddie delights in Mark's fussy perfectionism and Mark is reluctantly charmed by Eddie's sense of hope; basically, they're inevitable even when they don't think so.

I liked that this was a queer romance that wasn't centered around a gay awakening, or the homophobia and bigotry queer people experience. Mark and Eddie are both comfortable with their sexuality, and they never let their worries about being out (or as out as someone could safely be in the sixties) turn inwards into self-loathing. Outside of Mark's queer friends, the vast majority of secondary characters inhibit this middle-ground where some of them know to an extent what's going on between Mark and Eddie, or it's a gamble to come out to them so Mark and Eddie take risks where it matters, but otherwise don't.

There is something of a third-act break-up, but it's kind of half-hearted because Mark does a hilariously shitty job of the breaking-up part, and Eddie is unwilling to let go. And that's heartening in a way because nothing can separate these two.

The sex:

Super romantic, super tender and the payoff after all their tip-toeing around their feelings is worth it. There's also an element of exploration that I thought really worked, because while they've both had sex before, Eddie especially is still trying to figure out what he likes, and there's an openness between them that you get the sense wasn't possible for Eddie before.

I will say, while there are multiple open-door sex scenes, the language gets a little more vague when they're having sex, and the writing focuses more on what they're saying and feeling, as opposed to exactly what they're doing. That doesn't mean it's less hot, it's just a little less explicit. There are also a couple instances where there are breaks in the writing between foreplay and post-coital.

Overall:

This is such a soft love story set in a period I don't see often in historical romances, and I adored both Eddie and Mark. I'd absolutely recommend this book to every romance reader out there, and for any reader in particular looking for a romance that slowly but surely packs an emotional punch.

Thank you to Avon Books and NetGalley for an advanced copy of this book in exchange for my honest review.

[burningdarkfire]

books i read in jan 2024

[these are all short + casual reviews - feel free to ask about individual ones if u want my full thoughts or ask for my goodreads!!] 

the tail end of winter break + flights to the other side of the world and back + two week vacation means i am so fucking back, baby

prince's gambit (reread) + king's rising (reread) + the summer palace + the adventures of charls, the veretian cloth merchant + green but for a season - c.s. pacat ★★★★★ (fantasy romance)

nothing like tearing through the whole capri series to start off your year by changing your brain chemistry yet again. it's not a perfect series but it is so good at the erotic and the romantic and the perfect push and pull of tension !!

locklands - robert jackson bennett ★★★★★ (fantasy)

fantastic and utterly satisfying end to the series. i'm always trying to pitch these books as much as possible because the magic system is one of my favourites ever and rjb has an understanding of themes if i've ever seen one

[reread] jane, unlimited - kristin cashore ★★★★★ (YA fantasy)

still love this genre-bending mind-fuckery of a book. it's an interesting take on grief and a positive look at the potentiality of both the universe and individuals

a beautifully foolish endeavor - hank green ★★★★★ (scifi)

utterly shocked considering how little i liked the first book but i found this one compulsively readable and absurdly fun. it still reads like someone very online wrote it but i enjoyed the ride this time

the rest of us just live here - patrick ness ★★★★☆ (YA fantasy contemporary)

solid and pretty standard YA contemporary that has some bonus fun fantasy that made it much easier to swallow for someone who doesn't like YA contemporaries very much

a power unbound - freya marske ★★★★☆ (historical fantasy romance)

decent conclusion to the series and a hot romance that kept me invested, but the "plot" dragged and took up so much pagetime

bloodmarked - tracy deonn ★★★★☆ (YA fantasy)

obvious second book syndrome with wacky pacing and a bloated cast of characters, but it handled a lot of trope-y YA stuff pretty deftly and i am deeply curious where this plot is going to lead

moon of the turning leaves - waubgeshig rice ★★★★☆ (post-apocalyptic)

decent sequel that trades in the horror of the first book for a more survivalist bent. i don't think it's particularly interesting if you don't already like these sorts of books, but i do, so i liked this one as well

the trial of henry kissinger - christopher hitchens ★★★★☆ (political non-fiction)

def not kissinger for babies but the writing was solid and easy to follow, even if i knew nothing about the politics going in

eileen - ottessa moshfegh ★★★☆☆ (thriller)

relentlessly unpleasant to read but the frame story gave it an interesting flair. i've always found ottessa moshfegh's works worth reading even if i don't exactly enjoy them

annihilation - jeff vandermeer ★★★☆☆ (scifi)

extremely slow to start but it does eventually cohere into something? the writing was beautiful and i understand why everyone highlights it as atmospheric

small things like these - claire keegan ★★★☆☆ (historical)

complete nothing of a book to me. wasn't good, wasn't bad, totally fine, just didn't make me feel anything and i probably won't ever think about it again

the perfect crimes of marian hayes - cat sebastian ★★★☆☆ (historical romance)

the plot of this book was so so bad and unfortunately rather important to the flow but it did feature two character tropes and a romance that were exactly my type of shit. i would describe this as "if you closed both eyes and ignored the plot entirely it's almost an astrid/wulf fic" and that's how i had fun

you made a fool of death with your beauty - akwaeke emezi ★★★☆☆ (romance)

the banter and relationship with the FMC's best friend was by far the best part of the book. i liked the premise of the main romance, but it ended up being insta-love despite the incredible setup. also read like it was so concerned with being beautiful that it forgot to be horny or passionate or even interesting

lumberjanes vol. 1-2 - n.d. stevensen et al. ★★☆☆☆ (children's graphic novel)

tried to be coherent in the wrong sorts of ways and didn't lean into childish whimsy the way it should have, but the art was cute. it wasn't bad but i'd never choose to give it to a kid

[aoarcturus]

Interview Music Tag Game

thank you sm for the tag @tempusfugitandallthatblog <3

RULES: put your playlist on shuffle. For each of the 10 interview questions, select a lyric from the random songs that come up. (Skip if there aren’t any lyrics and make sure to drop the name of the song in your Interview answer!) <3

1. First off, how would you describe yourself in one sentence?

Why am I so obsessive? // Hanging onto every sentence

She calls me back - Noah Kahan

2. What kind of [sagittarius] are you?

But I’m not gonna go down with my hometown in a tornado // I’m gonna chase it

I know the end - Phoebe Bridgers

3. You’re visiting your favourite spot, what are you thinking about?

There’s no plan, there’s no hand on the rein // As Mack explained, there will be darkness again

No plan - Hozier

4. If your life was a movie, what do you think the review would say about it?

I know I’ve been a little bit off and that’s my mistake

Eugene - Arlo Parks

5. Say you got a book deal, what are you titling your memoir?

We didn’t get it right but, love, we did our best // And we will again

All things end - Hozier

6. What would you say about your best friends?

There’s meaning on earth, I’m happy

Then view between villages - Noah Kahan

7. Think back to when you had everything all figured out in high school, what was your life motto as a teenager?

I was dancing in the rain // I felt alive and I can’t complain // But no, take me home // take me home where I belong // I can’t take it anymore

Runaway - Aurora

8. Describe your aesthetic?

Move like an odd sight come out at night

Movement - Hozier (idk if this one really makes sense but idk I found it funny)

9. What’s a lyric that they’ll quote in your eulogy?

He feels the coming of a squall // Will drag him out a greater length // But knows his strength, and tries to gather it

Through me the flood - Hozier

10. And for our final question, say we believe in soulmates, what do you think their first impression of meeting you will be?

I was following a trail I’d never been along before // Chasing darkened skies above me

Waiting for the moon to rise - Belle & Sebastian

Uhmmm (stressing over tagging as per usual) tagging @cosmiconstellations @evyltalks @canismjr @anythingforourmoonysstuff @ravens-remember and anyone else who wants too :)) (If uve already done this sry lol)

[steelbluehome]

"For the first hour of the film, Stan’s Trump is, deliberately, not the man we know today: his voice has a slight Queens bray, but he avoids all the caricaturist’s tics, murmurs softly and almost tenderly at times, even when describing his ambitious. Stan plays him as he’s written, nervous and unformed and frankly sympathetic"

Little White Lies (click for article)

Mark Asch

The Apprentice – first-look review

Ali Abbasi's attempted takedown of America's previous (and perhaps next) President of the United States, charting his early years under the mentorship of Roy Cohn, lacks the killer instinct.

Did you know Donald Trump is in Paris Is Burning? No, really: in Jennie Livingston’s seismic documentary on New York’s queer ballroom scene, an independent film about people at the margins, there’s an insert shot of a Forbes magazine cover: “What I Learned in the 80s” is the cover feature, and right underneath it, back row center in an illustration of various one-percenters luminaries, there he is, in between check-ins with Willi Ninja and Venus Xtravaganza.

When Trump was elected President of the United States in 2016, so much of American culture became retrospectively seeded with Easter eggs foreshadowing his eventual ascent to the seat of power; future generations, unlike mine, will have no trouble imagining how this could possibly have happened. For so long Trump was present within discourses on business, crime, race, and politics; he was in Home Alone 2 and had a show on NBC; he was a late-night talk-show punchline and appeared at Wrestlemania. He was so ubiquitous, for so long — how could he not have become President?

The point I want to make here is that there is very little we don’t know about Donald Trump; his rise to the White House was accompanied and indeed fueled by wall-to-wall coverage across all forms of media, which during his (first) term as President enjoyed a boom in readership and revenues — there was always another article breaking another new scandal, or unearthing another embarrassing episode from his past that had been hiding in plain sight all along.

It is, then, very difficult to make a movie that has something new to say about Donald Trump, that tells a new story or shows a new side of the most famous person — probably — you’re not supposed to say this — but they’re saying — many people are saying — he’s the most famous person, frankly, that we’ve ever seen, and we’re seeing him more and more. The task before The Apprentice — a biopic telling the story of Trump’s rise in the New York real estate world in the 70s and 80s, abetted by the notorious fixer Roy Cohn — is therefore a formidable one, and it’s not a task to which director Ali Abbasi and screenwriter Gabriel Sherman prove remotely equal.

The film begins in New York City, in the 70s, at an exclusive members’ club where Trump (Sebastian Stan), the twentysomething son of outerboro slumlord Fred (an unrecognizable Martin Donovan), restlessly narrates the power players in the room to his bored date; Trump is an outsider, a striver, palpably uncomfortable — but there, through a doorway, doing the Kubrick Stare, is Roy Cohn, former Joe McCarthy aide during the the Red Scare of the 1950s and infamous lawyer for mobsters and other power players, publicly revealed after his death from AIDS to be a closeted gay man. Cohn takes an interest in Trump, and smooths the wheels for his first big deal, the overhaul of the old Commodore on Manhattan’s then-decrepit 42nd Street.

Trump’s relationship with Cohn was widely reported on during his presidency, so much so that Cohn — a figure notorious enough to have been played by James Woods in a TV movie in the 1990s, and Al Pacino in the HBO miniseries of the Pulitzer-winning Angels in America — has been retconned as primarily Trump’s mentor; a feature-length documentary about him is titled Where’s My Roy Cohn?, after an Oval Office lament. So it’s not exactly newsworthy that the film credits Cohn with teaching Trump to affect a brashness and flair and to learn to attack, deny, and dominate the narrative — nor are these particular novel insights into Trump.

For the first hour of the film, Stan’s Trump is, deliberately, not the man we know today: his voice has a slight Queens bray, but he avoids all the caricaturist’s tics, murmurs softly and almost tenderly at times, even when describing his ambitious. Stan plays him as he’s written, nervous and unformed and frankly sympathetic, genuinely drawn to Ivana (Maria Bakalova) for her ambitions, a finicky and unschooled naïf wandering around Cohn’s decadent parties avoiding the drugs and gay sex. He’s a would-be shark so doughy and vague as to be almost sympathetic, like the budding young Nazi collaborator of Louis Malle’s Lacombe, Lucien.

The almost sympathetic cast of the film’s first hour is, I suppose, a fresh perspective, but equally an offensive and shallow one, driven less by any particular insight into the perverse incentives of American society — the film is remarkably insular, shot largely on soundstage recreations of the Trump home in Jamaica Estates, the penthouse in Trump Tower, the backs of various limos and the offices of various power brokers — than by the dictates of a character arc in which Cohn and Fred are obviously posited as polar opposite father figures, demanding and competitive men after whom Donald models himself and whose approval he seeks.

A number of things change at the film’s halfway mark. The film switches from a celluloid to a digital look — throughout, Abassi and cinematographer Kasper Tuxen ape the period of the action, from seamy red-tinted narrow-gauge for the gritty 70s to a bleary pixelated look that improves throughout the 80s—a gesture that would give the film an appealing momentum and raw texture were the narrative not so wedded to the historical record, with cutesy cameos from Warhol and Rupert Murdoch, and knowing references to the Trump Tower elevators, MAGA, and other future features of American life. Stock-footage montages exposit the eras’ historical context via potted histories of New York City, with an unclear point of view on the cycle of urban decline and rebirth in the postwar era: though lightly in quotation marks, they also seem objective accounts of a general historical record that gives credence to the narrative of White Flight–era NYC as “Fear City” (an image of lawlessness Trump long exploited, first as a developer and then as a demagogue), and of the go-go Reagan 80s, the decade in which Trump applied all of what he learned in the 70s, and of which he became an avatar.

At this point in the film, Stan’s dialogue takes on the familiar turns of phrase, the verbal and physical mannerisms: the diet pill— the pursed lips, the overenunciation and theatrical hand gestures, the addled mile-a-minute grandiose rants and flippant dismissals and breathtaking glibness and oddly matronly cattiness. It’s funny, but hardly virgin territory the years we’ve spent enjoying the work of comedians like James Austin Johnson and that one friend of yours who sends you voice memos in the Trump voice talking about the discourses of the day, impersonators who reshape the news by pushing the man’s implicit grotesquery and absurdity to the fore.

This Trump gets more flagrantly cruel to Ivana, delusional, thin-skinned and aggressive. It’s the kind of charismatic antihero’s journey that might fly in a Scorsese film — arguably the ultimate Trump film is The Wolf of Wall Street — but Abassi and Sherman’s take on the material is largely dutiful. The soundtrack aspires to an incongruously feel-good high-energy looseness that the film doesn’t back up. I’ve never been unhappier to hear Suicide, Pet Shop Boys or New Order, and the smash cut and needle drop that takes us out of after Trump’s rape of Ivana (a scene from her divorce deposition, staged as literally and luridly as you’d expect from the director of Holy Spider) is especially egregious.

Maybe there’s supposed to be a larger point about Trump’s political movement in the way that he’s shown to abandon Cohn as his former mentor’s legal aides and health woes pile up, but Cohn recedes from the narrative in the second half of the film, which is much less grounded in their relationship; though as Cohn weakens from a virus he steadfastly denied, the second hour is his turn to be portrayed more sympathetically than he deserves.

Strong has the same problem in his performance as Stan, in that Cohn is almost as media-saturated a figure as Trump. Strong gives Cohn a low, aggressive voice, slightly nasal and rounded, with casual and cruel inflections tossed out at a Succession-trained tempo; he bobs his neck up and down like a turtle on each syllable, but holds it forward tentatively as if the muscles are atrophying, as Cohn becomes frailer. It’s a credible performance, not remotely campy, but not really anything — there’s nothing here like the perspective on the role as interpreted by, say, the underground theater legend Ron Vawter in his performance piece Roy Cohn/Jack Smith, in which he gave Cohn a shrill, mincing Jewish voice, flaunting the traits most concealed and loathed by his recently deceased subject.

Recognizable figures are a fun challenge for actors, as well as for the hair, makeup, and wardrobe departments tasked with recreating iconic looks that everyone remembers from recent history. This year, election season is also Oscar-movie season, and you can expect some attention from the crafts teams on The Apprentice and maybe Strong or Sherman (one of the many glossy-magazine journalists to enjoy an elevated profile since the Trump years). I’m sure their acceptance speeches will be full of righteous anger directed at the new administration.

PUBLISHED 21 MAY 2024