10 Actors Who Just Recently Did Their Best Work Ever

Sebastian Stan is a somewhat hit-or-miss actor. As he's shown in things like I, Tonya and Pam & Tommy, he can be very good, but some of his other work - including his most famous role as Bucky Barnes in the Marvel Cinematic Universe - is understated to the point of tedium. If nothing else, he seemed like a strange choice to play the young Donald Trump in The Apprentice. But what do you know, Stan is formidable in the part.

The Apprentice - an excellent movie, and one of the year's most underrated - charts Trump's early years and the Faustian relationship between him and attorney Roy Cohn (Jeremy Strong, also superb), who helps Trump rise but finds himself discarded by his protegee when he needs his help. Stan absolutely nails Trump's metamorphosis from an insecure young man with daddy issues to a ruthless, tyrannical business mogul. It's a performance that grows with the character, making this acting turn a tour-de-force in character development. 

While Stan is frequently chilling as Trump (and this performance is going to get harder and harder to watch now that he's been re-elected), he never turns the man into a hateful cartoon and imbues him with humanity and vulnerability, making this an unsympathetic yet measured and nuanced portrayal of arguably one of the most loathed men alive today. Sebastian Stan has never been better.