Dennis Quaid’s new TV role echoes Donald Trump

As Sam Brukner, Dennis Quaid (center) has the art world at his beck and call. Photo: Crackle Sony TV

 

Crackle, the free streaming site most known for Jerry Seinfeld’s amusing, low-key “Comedians in Cars Getting Coffee” is delving into a decidedly more glamorous setting for its first drama series “The Art of More” — that of high-end auction houses, with their exorbitant purchase prices and rapacious cast of characters.

“Every time I see on the news about a Van Gogh painting selling for hundreds of millions of dollars or Elvis’ original Cadillac, people turn around and take notice of it,” star Dennis Quaid tells The Post. “It brings out the basest of human emotions — greed and lust and envy.

“It’s rife for drama.”

In the series (all 10 episodes of which premiere Thursday), Quaid plays Sam Brukner, a brash New York real estate tycoon with political ambitions who bears more than a little resemblance to Donald Trump.

“He definitely came to mind in the description of the character,” says Quaid, who has golfed with the now-presidential candidate a few times. “About two months into shooting [Trump] announced [his candidacy]. We had to laugh because it was just too good.”

Much of the conflict in “The Art of More” stems from the two rival auction houses that covet Brukner’s art collection. Representing Parke-Mason is Graham Connor (Christian Cooke), a rookie account man who shares Brukner’s military/blue collar background. Eager to prove that he belongs among the elite, Graham faces off with DeGraaf executive Roxana Whitman (Kate Bosworth), the upper crust daughter of the firm’s CEO. Not surprisingly, she has a romantic past with Brukner.

Roxana (Kate Bosworth, above) signs a client on his death bed in “The Art of More.”Photo: Crackle Sony TV

“She is highly intelligent, calculating, and she has a seemingly impenetrable armor. She’s a woman in a man’s world and so she’s constantly having to prove herself,” says Bosworth, who modeled Roxana after the many femme fatales played by Michelle Pfeiffer. “The audience is never quite sure what side of the line she’s on and she could turn at any moment. She’s unpredictable and I mean that in both the cunning and cutting side but also in a more vulnerable way, as well.”

Graham and Roxana take a win-at-any-cost approach to their jobs, whether it’s him getting pulled back into the antiquities smuggling trade he practiced as a soldier in Iraq or her signing a high-profile client on his deathbed.

“What’s interesting about all the characters, Roxana included, is there’s a real questionable morality to all of them because they’re all in desperate situations and feel the need to prove themselves in different ways,” Bosworth says.

“There’s a lot of greed in that world,” she adds. “At least with our show, there’s a real sexiness to it … All these characters are holding their cards to their chest and not giving too much away.”