Cardinal Lamberto left Rome with a large sum of money and several documents. Fearing that their corruption will be exposed, Keinszig, Lucchesi, and Gilday plot to murder the Pope. Gilday poisons the pontiff's tea, killing him in his sleep. The character of Lamberto and the film's depiction of the events which led to his murder are based upon one of the conspiracy theories surrounding the sudden death of the real-life Pope John Paul I, Albino Luciani. Like the Lamberto character, Luciani was discovered dead in his bed in 1978, 33 days after his election to the papacy. Various theories, such as the
Pope Anastasius III Pope Anastasius III Pope Anastasius III (died June 913) was Pope from April 911 to his death in 913. He was a Roman by birth. A Roman nobleman, Lucian, is sometimes recognized as his father, although other sources assert that he was the illegitimate son of his predecessor Pope Sergius III (904–911). Almost nothing is recorded of Pope Anastasius III, his pontificate falling in the period when Rome and the Papacy were in the power of Theophylact, Count of Tusculum, and his wife Theodora, who approved Anastasius III's candidacy. Under his reign the Normans of Rollo were evangelized. His papacy