Despite its large budget and a well-known cast, the producers decided not to release it because they found the director's cut to be unacceptable.

Shilovsky eventually sold the rights to producer Scott Steindorff of Stone Village Productions, who commissioned Caroline Thompson to write the script.

The second story, set in Jerusalem, describes the inner struggle of Pontius Pilate before, during, and after the conviction and execution of Jesus.

The third part tells the love story between a nameless writer in Moscow in the 1930s and his lover, Margarita.

He has written a novel on Pontius Pilate, a subject which was taboo in the officially anti-religious atheistic Soviet Union.