The Death of Stalin

Plot(Spoiler Alert)

In 1953 Russia, dictator Joseph Stalin has died and his cronies square off in a frantic power struggle to become the next Soviet leader.



Blaine: Armando Iannucci spent most of his career writing and directing episodes for HBO’s “Veep”, but then he left after season 4. Armando's first love was film and the first movie he directed was a comedy called “In the Loop”. After he left “Veep”, Armando was interested in directing another film. What came to his mind was dictators. In 2015, Gaunmont, a French film company, had sent Armando this graphic novel, “The Death of Stalin”, along with a note saying they were interested in making it into a film and they asked him what he thought of it. Armando thought “The Death of Stalin” was a perfect combination of humor and something horrifying. Armando didn’t know what to think about adapting someone else’s work because he wrote a lot of his own stuff. Most of the stuff in the novel was fiction and the rest was true like the fact that when Stalin collapsed the guards outside his room did nothing. Another thing that is fact is that no one got him a doctor because he had all the doctors arrested after they were trying to kill him.

Armando was able to put together a great ensemble. As the cast grew, more and more actors were interested in being a part of the project just to be a part of the ensemble. Another reason why they wanted to be in “The Death of Stalin” was because of Armando himself. They just believed in him. Steve Buscemi already knew he would be in good hands after having a nice conversation with Armando on the phone about the project and he felt like Armando was directing him through the phone.

What Armando loved most about the project was the ensemble and he was very excited to do the scenes where a lot of the actors are together. The actors were happy to come together to rehearse scenes. Armando put them together in a meeting room in a hotel so they could spend a lot of quality time together and get to know each other while rehearsing. The actors would rehearse and Armando would be wandering around the room trying to figure out a good angle or position for a shot. Rehearsal would last two weeks. The actors would rehearse scenes where they weren’t all together and the actors who weren’t in that scene would just stand by and watch the other actors rehearse. They would get to watch what the characters would be doing when they are not together and it’s something actors don’t usually do for a film.

Armando would talk to each one of the actors one at a time about the character they were going to play, what they resemble and their personality. He provided them with information on their characters. The actors didn’t have to speak in a Russian accent because Armando felt it didn’t matter because there is more than one Russian accent.

“The Death of Stalin” was shot during the Summer of 2016 and their schedule was very tight. They were able to shoot big ensemble scenes very quickly thanks to all that rehearsing they did. The actors felt like they were in a play when they did scenes together. Armando wanted there to be scenes that weren’t funny. They had to be shocking, dramatic or moving. Armando wanted the audience to be engaged with “The Death of Stalin” and enjoy it as a comedy. But he also wanted to recreate the same sort of anxiety that people must have felt at the time. The rules were if you made a mistake you would get shot and die. A lot of Russian soldiers are going around killing their own people who have made a mistake. No one knows if they are going to survive during the day or night. All they know is that they don’t want to get shot. “The Death of Stalin” was an experience no one wanted to end because it was a lot of fun.

My rating on “The Death of Stalin” is five out of five stars













Sundance premiere