Armando Iannucci on Biden and “Stalin’s death”

Though shot in 2016, before Donald Trump’s Election College victory, The Death of Stalin was immediately hailed as a timely political satire when it premiered at the 2017 Toronto International Film Festival. How could it be otherwise? The Death of Stalin comes from Armando Iannucci, one of the greatest humorists of his generation, known for capturing government in all its obscene ineptitude. Famous in the UK with The Thick of It and In the Loop, and across the pond in the US with the hit TV series Veep, The Death of Stalin marks the first time the writer-director has tackled actual history.

Based on the French graphic novel “La Mort de Staline,” the film is a comedic take on the social and political power struggle that followed the death of Russian leader Joseph Stalin in 1953. Featuring an all-star cast that includes Steve Buscemi, Andrea Riseborough, Jason Isaacs, Simon Russell Beale, Rupert Friend, Michael Palin, and many others, “The Death of Stalin” often feels like a horror film, haunting the public and sparking behind-the-scenes intrigue that is immediately put into action when an opportunity presents itself.

In a recent interview with Politico’s West Wing Playbook newsletter, just before President Biden withdrew from the 2024 presidential election and endorsed Vice President Kamala Harris, Iannucci discussed the new relevance the film gained following Biden’s performance at the debate and the three weeks of chaos that followed.

“The scene that has always stuck with me is the committee scene at the end of the movie where everyone is voting on what to do. And of course nobody wants to be the first to raise their hand because they could be wrong and get shot. Everyone looks to see what everyone else says before they raise their hand to vote,” Iannucci said. “And I think that’s what happens, too, right? Everyone thinks, ‘Yeah, he doesn’t have another four years.’ But nobody wants to be the first to say it. I imagine nobody wants to be the first among their closest confidants to actually say, ‘That’s not going to happen.'”

Iannucci may have been on the right track, as Biden took many weeks to make a decision that others came to immediately after his performance against Trump in late June. But Biden’s graceful decision to step aside and pass the torch to the next generation reminds one of the true meaning of “The Death of Stalin,” which is that you shouldn’t let tyrants in. Real leadership is egoless and for the good of the people, and many will say that’s what Biden is currently displaying. The same cannot be said of the would-be insurgent Donald Trump, whose influence, Iannucci fears, has corrupted our country at large.

“We did (‘The Death of Stalin’) before Trump (took office). But I think what’s happened since then is that facts are now irrelevant. We’ve retreated into these camps where we only talk to people who agree with us and only get news that tells us the stories we want to hear,” Iannucci told West Wing Playbook. “We’re all now being conditioned to think that what we believe is the only truth there is, and that every autocratic and totalitarian government has participated in it. It just tells you that there is only one authentic truth, and that therefore anyone who disagrees is unpatriotic and a traitor.”