Donald Trump’s film contains a rape scene with Ivana Trump, to which his campaign responds

A new film about Donald Trump’s life in the 1970s and 1980s is causing controversy.

The Apprenticein which Sebastian Stan can be seen as a young Trump in New York City, Maria Bakalova (Borat 2) as his first wife Ivana and Jeremy Strong as lawyer Roy Cohn, premiered on May 20 at the 2024 Cannes Film Festival.

The film includes a shocking scene in which Stan’s Trump character is seen raping his then-wife Ivana on the floor while she begs him to stop.

Trump campaign communications director Steven Cheung said in a statement after the film’s premiere: “We will be filing a lawsuit to challenge the patently false claims made by these pseudo-filmmakers.”

“This garbage is pure fiction that sensationalizes long-debunked lies,” Cheung added. “This ‘film’ is pure malicious slander, should not see the light of day, and does not even deserve a spot in the straight-to-DVD bargain section of a soon-to-be-closing discount movie store.” It belongs in a dumpster fire.”

Despite threats of legal action from Trump’s campaign, the film’s director, Abbasi, 43, appeared unconcerned at a festival press conference for the film on May 21.

“I mean, everyone talks about him suing a lot of people – but they don’t talk about his success rate, you know?” Abbasi said. The filmmaker added that he doesn’t necessarily think he wouldn’t like this film.

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“I don’t necessarily think he would like it. I think he would be surprised,” the filmmaker added. “As I said, I would be happy – I would offer to meet him wherever he wants and talk about the context of the film, do a screening and then have a conversation if that’s for someone from Trump’s campaign people here are interesting.”

Ivana, who was married to Donald from 1977 until their divorce in 1990, once accused him of raping her during their divorce proceedings in the late ’80s, The Daily Beast reported in 2015. She later recanted this statement in 1993, explaining at the time that although she felt “hurt” she “did not want my words to be interpreted in a literal or criminal sense.”

In a 2015 statement, Ivana, who died in 2022 at the age of 73, said: “The story is completely baseless. Donald and I are best friends and have raised three children together that we love and are very proud of.” When PEOPLE asked Donald about his ex-wife’s claim in May 2016, he said, “It never happened.”

An official description of the Cannes Festival for The Apprentice says the film “shows a young Donald Trump’s rise to power through a Faustian bargain with influential right-wing lawyer and political fixer Roy Cohn.” The film has not yet finalized a distribution deal to release the film in U.S. theaters.

If you or someone you know has been sexually assaulted, please contact the National Sexual Assault Hotline at 1-800-656-HOPE (4673) or go to rainn.org.