An American rock-n-roll performer becomes a phenomenon in the Soviet Union at the peak of the Cold War, but as the tensions between the US and the USSR ease, his past compromises come back to haunt him.

At the height of the Cold War, Dean Reed, an aspiring rock-and-roll performer from Colorado, becomes an unlikely superstar behind the Iron Curtain. But as the standoff between the United States and the USSR draws to a close, the compromises Dean made in the past catch up with him. No longer useful to the Soviets, Dean finds his life collapsing. Grappling with his identity, he is desperate to return to the U.S. Two weeks after a 60 Minutes profile of Dean by Mike Wallace airs on CBS, his body is found in a lake near his house in East Berlin.