It is an adaptation of Nikolai Erdman’s “The Suicide”.

When Erdman wrote “The Suicide” in 1930, two major theatres in Moscow were interested in the text: the Meyerhold’s Theatre and Konstantin Stanislavski’s Moscow Art Theatre (MAT). Both started rehearsals, none held a premiere. „The rehearsal at the Meyerhold’s Theatre was unexpectedly attended by some high-ranking officials. The play was taken down.” Stanislavski’s interventions with Stalin came to nothing. It couldn’t have been any other way, as it was Stalin himself who banned the staging. Nevertheless, both “The Suicide”, and Erdman’s earlier play “The Mandate” became surrounded by legends and were circulated underground, with the most relevant lines becoming popular sayings. In the late 1960s “The Suicide” had its premieres in theatres in Western Europe, but the Russian premiere didn’t take place until 1982 when it was finally staged at the Moscow Satire Theatre, where all the Soviet plays previously banned by the censorship were being staged. However, after only five stagings, the play was banned again for another five years and in 1987 it was finally staged for a longer period of time.