Sacha Baron Cohen talks disappearing into 'cruel' new role for TV show 'Disclaimer'

Spoiler alert! The following story contains details of the first two episodes of Apple TV+ series "Disclaimer" (now streaming).

Sacha Baron Cohen has a knack for transformative roles, playing oafish Italian barbers and irreverent Kazakhstani journalists.

But in the new Apple TV+ series “Disclaimer,” the “Borat” star pulls off his greatest disappearing act yet: portraying a painfully ordinary guy. At the outset, Robert Ravenscroft (Cohen) is a doting husband to Catherine (Cate Blanchett), a celebrated journalist whose past comes back to haunt her in the form of a mysterious new novel, which bears a disturbing resemblance to her life. With his thick glasses, mop of hair and dour disposition, Robert is unrecognizable to fans who only know Cohen as an antics-prone comedian.

Watching the show, “I’ve had a couple people say, ‘I didn’t know where you were or if you were in it at all,’” says Cohen, 52, returning to the spotlight after his Oscar-nominated turn in 2020’s “The Trial of the Chicago 7.”

Unfamiliarity was the goal, says “Disclaimer” director Alfonso Cuarón (“Roma”): “Sacha was adamant that he needed to look like somebody else. It cannot be, ‘Oh, Sacha Baron Cohen is playing this guy.’ So when you do finally realize it’s Sacha, he already has all the credibility and truthfulness of the character.”

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Sacha Baron Cohen is not the 'perfect, supportive' spouse in 'Disclaimer'

Based on Renée Knight’s 2015 novel, the seven-episode “Disclaimer” is a “Scarlet Letter”-style thriller following Catherine, who is accused of having an affair with a young man named Jonathan (Louis Partridge) years ago while on vacation in Italy. Jonathan died saving Catherine’s 4-year-old son from drowning, and his parents (Kevin Kline and Lesley Manville) have sought revenge by writing a scandalous novel inspired by the events.

Jonathan’s father takes it a step further, sending Robert explicit photographs of Catherine taken by his late son. Enraged, Robert confronts Catherine about the affair at the end of Episode 2, dropping “this facade of the perfect, supportive male figure,” Cuarón says.

Cohen and Cuarón have been friends for two decades and previously discussed adapting a Lina Wertmüller novel for the screen. So as the Oscar-winning filmmaker assembled his “Disclaimer” cast, he decided to give Cohen a call.

Initially, “Sacha felt a bit daunted going out of a straight comedy,” Cuarón says. “Like his characters, his first impulse is to wear a mask.”

Our critic raves:Alfonso Cuarón's 'Disclaimer' is the best TV show of the year: Review

Cohen's biggest fear playing Robert was “the range of emotion: the sadness and anger, and this militant compassion while concealing his malice,” the actor says. “Robert feels insecure next to his incredibly successful spouse. He admires her but he’s jealous underneath, even though he can’t admit it to himself. This incident allows him to invert the power dynamic, and suddenly, he becomes an alpha male.”

After an awards dinner honoring Catherine in the first episode, Robert fondly tells her that “he’s always happy” to be her plus-one. It’s a line that Cohen asked Cuarón to add to the script, hinting that Robert may not be as placid and diffident as he lets on.

“He says it in a laughing way, but really, he’s saying, ‘I’m your plus-one and I wish you were mine. I wish it was you watching me receive an award,’” Cohen says. “He has a certain joy in destroying her under this illusion of justice. Robert is absolutely convinced of his own virtue, and he’s unaware of how cruel he’s becoming.”

Cate Blanchett breaks down that 'terrifying' confrontation scene

In the second episode’s explosive final scene, Robert lays into Catherine about her infidelity and nude pictures, calling her a distant lover and a bad mother to their troubled, now-grown son, Nicholas (Kodi Smit-McPhee). She hardly gets a word in during the seven-minute standoff at their kitchen table.

“It’s such a long scene, and so much of the rest of the series pivoted on the assumptions Robert was making and the prevention of Catherine from speaking,” Blanchett says. “Suddenly, she’s being written out of the narrative in such a strange way. There’s a lot of ebbs and flows in the scene, which is a joy but also quite terrifying as an actor.”

Cuarón insisted they film it all in one uninterrupted take, to better capture the charged feelings of the moment.

“I cry, I’m shouting, I’m betrayed, I’m suspicious, I have epiphanies, I’m drunk,” Cohen says with a laugh. “I begged Alfonso, ‘Can we please just do it in sections and edit it together later?’ And he said, ‘Absolutely not. Editing is an act of murder.’ He insisted that we do it again and again, so I think we did about 17 takes in a row.”

Viewers will learn Catherine’s side of the story as “Disclaimer” goes on, although Blanchett hesitates to say more.

“When I talked about the book with people who had read it, they’d always sort of raise an eyebrow,” she recalls. “They would never give away the ending, which is great. People get quite protective” about not revealing too much.

Cohen, too, encourages the audience to go on the ride before making any moral judgments.

“It’s really a story about destruction within a family,” Cohen teases. “People who are self-destructive rarely think they’re being self-destructive.”