Agnieszka Holland’s compelling, FIPRESCI Prize-winning debut film goes behind the scenes of a theatre troupe to explore the human cost of censorship and ideological conflict in communist Poland. 

A young Warsaw theatre director travels to the provinces to mount a classic Polish play with a local company and finds himself in conflict with its ageing lead actor, Krzysztof. Pushed to the brink, Krzysztof risks his already fraught relationship with his wife, Anka, and his sanity in pursuit of one final great performance.

While not intended by the director as a thesis on censorship, Provincial Actors was made under the censor’s attentive eye and is resolutely a young artist’s declaration of the tortures of creative expression within oppressive regimes. Part black comedy on collective ideological delusion, part intimate tragedy of one man’s mental decline, it is a film that wholly and persuasively captures the desperate mood of its time.

“Agnieszka Holland’s debut feature film serves as an insightful reminder of the real-world anxieties that creative artists suffer in communist societies.” – Senses of Cinema