In the closing credits of “The Death of Stalin,” his successor Malenkov, played by Jeffrey Tambor fades from the screen, another casualty in the battle for power after Stalin’s death.
Stalin henchman Beria was a brutal schemer and Malenkov his useful idiot. Beria, played by blustering and blistering British stage veteran Simon Russell Peale, ends up executed in “Murder on the Orient Express” fashion and a cunning Kruschev, played by a perpetually exasperated Steve Buscemi, emerged to become leader of the Soviet Union from 1953 to 1964.