Creating provocative theatre carries great personal risks: emotional, financial and artistic. For the members of the Belarus Free Theatre, however, there are additional risks: censorship, bans on working, imprisonment. Director Madeleine Sackler goes behind the scenes with the troupe of artists who defy Europe’s last remaining dictatorship. The Belarus Free Theatre reacts to the thought police and other repressive measures with underground performances. David against Goliath on the alternative scene.

Dangerous Acts Starring the Unstable Elements of Belarus picks up the story in 2010 when the KGB is cracking down on dissenters, sixteen years after Belarus’ President Alexander Lukashenko took power during the breakup of the Soviet Union. Now, as a new election looms, the KGB targets the Free Theatre‘s founders Nikolai Khalezin and Natalia Koliada. Torn between their political engagement and their families’ safety, they continue their work in exile in New York and London.