Kaljo Kiisk

Kaljo Kiisk (1925-2007) was an Estonian actor, director, screenwriter, and politician. At the age of 18, he briefly served under the SS in Nazi-occupied Estonia, a fact that he later managed to conceal from Soviet officials. Working in the theatre in post-war Estonia, Kiisk staged an adaptation of national poet Oskar Luts’ novel Spring, and he would later star in Arvo Kruusement’s 1969 film version of the same book, widely recognised as the greatest Estonian film of all time, for which Kiisk also contributed the screenplay. As a film director, his most famous works included Naughty Curves (1959), Dangerous Curves (1961), the cult satire Madness (1969), which was banned from theatres for almost twenty years, and Nipernaadi (1983).