The big question is who will play Alex Salmond if the epic battle between Donald Trump and local residents over a luxury golf resort on the Aberdeenshire coast is to be turned into a feature film.
The film’s creators are hoping for an A-list movie star such as Alec Baldwin to play the role of Donald Trump — but are still discussing who would be right to play Scotland’s first minister. “We will certainly be spreading the net far and wide for someone to play him”, said Anthony Baxter, the film’s director.
The movie will loosely chronicle the efforts of a handful of residents who lived close to the Menie estate in Aberdeen and who tried to challenge Mr Trump’s £750 million development on their land, which was also a site of special scientific interest.
Mr Baxter has described the development as the “most controversial in recent Scottish history” and said the local residents’ David and Goliath struggle lent itself to the big screen. “They are such an extraordinary group of people and real-life characters who have been so inspirational,” he said.
Their long battle against Mr Trump made headlines across the world and inspired Mr Baxter, a journalist and film-maker, to make an award-winning documentary, You’ve Been Trumped, in 2011. His sequel, A Dangerous Game, which charts more recent challenges faced by the Menie residents, had its Aberdeen premiere yesterday.
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The documentaries placed a spotlight on the apparent cosy relationship between the American tycoon and the first minister, whose government approved the resort.
Mr Salmond, who is the MSP for the area, declined to be interviewed for either of Mr Baxter’s documentaries on the building of the resort.
Mr Baxter believes Mr Salmond has failed local residents living near the golf course. “It’s eight years down the line, we’ve got one golf course, built on a site of special scientific interest. That’s the highest accolade a country can bestow to protect land and it was overturned on the promise of all this economic development which hasn’t been delivered and there is no prospect of it being delivered now.”
A Scottish government spokesman said: “Clearly, it would not have been appropriate for the first minister to undertake an interview at a time when the Trump Organisation was pursuing a judicial review through the court of session of the government’s decision to grant consent for the European offshore wind deployment centre.”
The film will be produced by Chris Young, the Skye-based producer behind The Inbetweeners. He has described the tale as a “cross between The Full Monty and Seven Samurai.”
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Mr Trump said he hoped he would be played by “someone good-looking”.