Jeff Daniels 'Drew Inspiration' from Eric Trump to Play This 'Dumb' Yet Iconic Movie Character

Veteran actor Jeff Daniels recently appeared on The View to promote his latest Netflix satire, A Man in Full. During the panel discussion, Daniels reminisced about the iconic character Harry Dunne from his 2014 hit Dumb and Dumber. While he was asked if he channeled his 'inner' Donald Trump for the character, Daniels actually revealed it was Eric Trump, not the impeached president, who served as the basis for his inspiration.

“The key to Harry Dunne was, don’t act dumb, be dumb,” he explained to the co-hosts. “So, for whatever reason, I determined that he had an IQ of eight. Single digit IQ — not seven, not nine, eight.” The two-time Emmy winner added that he acted out the character as if he was 'on a half-second' delay. In response, co-host Joy Behar wondered aloud if he drew inspiration from Donald to play Harry. Instead, Daniels leaned forward in his chair and joked, 'Eric.' Both the audience and the table laughed heartily, and Behar agreed, “He is the dumbest one, you’re right.”

As per The Wrap, Daniels mentioned he hadn't even given Donald a second thought for this role. As per The Hill, earlier in April, Daniels expressed that given the current 'war on democracy,' voters in the 2024 general election are likely to select President Joe Biden. The Tony Award winner claimed that the potential GOP nominee 'talks down' to people from the Midwest and that voters in the 'middle' are 'watching' the GOP 'destroy itself.' 

“But we’re flyover country, and we’re always, we got a chip on our shoulder about that. And we get [it] – we’re not as stupid as people, like Trump in particular, think we are. He talks down to us. He talks past us. He lies to us. And but we get it,” Daniels said while appearing on MSNBC’s Morning Joe as he promoted his new drama. According to Daniels, there are two 'wars' ongoing— one for 'democracy' and one within the Republican Party, because the contest voters want to get to is in 2028. He argued that voters in the 'middle' would choose Biden in November.  

“And I think that’s when the voters – and I would be – I’m cautiously optimistic that the people in the middle, the people in states like Michigan, are going to go, ‘you know what? We’re better than this,” Daniels said. “I’m going to vote for Biden, even though he’s old, which also translates into wise and wisdom, which we may need right now because the election I want to vote on is the one in 2028 when people are now running with the future.’ All those folks,” he said. According to a recent CNN study, Trump defeated Biden among registered voters in a hypothetical setup with 49% support (as opposed to 43% for Biden).