2. The Magic Theatre

Margarita meets the gangster. The Master's in the asylum and the diaboloical Professor Woland and his talking cat are about to appear at the Variety Theatre. Devilish chaos comes to Moscow!

Mikhail Bulgakov's fantastical novel The Master and Margarita is a satire of life in 1930s Soviet Russia.

The second of a four-part dramatisation, starring Daniel Massey as Woland, Michael Maloney as The Master and Geraldine James as Margarita.

Unpublished during Bulgakov’s lifetime (1891-1940), The Master and Margarita was smuggled out of the USSR and first fully published in Paris in 1967.

Woland .... Daniel Massey
The Master .... Michael Maloney
Margarita .... Geraldine James
Bezdomny .... Nigel Anthony
Koroviev .... Colin Jeavons
Azazello .... John Hollis
Behemoth .... David Holt
Natasha .... Melanie Hudson
Inspector .... Eric Allan
Sergeant .... Jonathan Adams
Bengalsky .... Jonathan Tafler
Berlioz .... John Fleming
Rimsky .... Peter Penry Jones
Baron Maigel .... John Webb
Latunsky .... John Church
Nina .... Linda Polan
Nurse .... Melinda Walker

Translated by Michael Glennie.

Dramatised in four parts by Brian Wright.

Director: David Hitchinson

First broadcast on BBC Radio 4 in November 1992.