Fritz Weaver (Josef Weiss), Rosemary Harris (Berta Weiss), James Woods (Karl Weiss), Meryl Streep (Inga Weiss), Michael Moriarty (Erik Dorf), Joseph Bottoms (Rudi Weiss), Tovah Feldshuh (Helena), Sam Wanamaker (Moses Weiss), Ian Holm (Heinrich Himmler), David Warner (Reinhard Heydrich), Lee Montague (Uncle Sasha), Marius Goring (Heinrich Palitz), Blanche Bake (Anna Weiss), Deborah Norton (Marta Dorf), Robert Stephens (Kurt Dorf), Michael Beck (Hans Helms), Tom Bell (Adolf Eichmann), Ian Holm (Heinrich Himmler), Lee Montague (Uncle Sasha), George Rose (Franz Lowy), David Warner (Reinhard Heydrich), John Bailey (Hans Frank), Isolde Barth (Eva), Michael Beck (Hans Helms), Vera Borek (Nadya), Vernon Dobtcheff (Karp), Peter Garell (Yuri), Edward Gilkrist (Peter Dorf), Courtney Hill (Laura Dorf), Kathina Kaiser (Sarah Ohlnick), Wolfgang Lesowsky (Engleman), Jeremy Levy (Aaron Feldman), T.P. McKenna (Blobel), Ian Odle (Aaron’s Classmate), Irene Prador (Maria Kalova), George Pravda (Otto Felscher), Oscar Quitak (Tesch), John Rees (Colonel Arthur Nebe), Toby Salaman (Kovel), Murray Salem (Analavitz), Ortwin Speer (Warsaw Ghetto Policeman), Gabor Vernon (Rabbi Samuel), Peter Vogel (Emil Frey)

1942: Karl is transferred to the propaganda art studio at Theresienstadt, the paradise ghetto in Czechoslovakia, maintained by the Nazis to fool Red Cross and neutral observers. Karl and the other artists secretly sketch the brutal reality of the camp. While living among the partisans, Rudi marries Helena. Dorf and Heydrich accompany Himmler to a mass shooting. Disgusted by how grisly it is, Himmler demands a more efficient murder method be found. Dorf attends a demonstration of a gas van. The partisans ambush a group of Ukrainian Trawnikis. Rudi is traumatized when he must kill one. Moses smuggles guns into the Warsaw ghetto. Himmler, Heydrich and Dorf plan the expansion of Auschwitz into a mass killing center. Inga convinces Müller, who has fallen in love with her, to denounce her and have her sent to Theresienstadt, where she joins Karl. After Heydrich’s assassination, Dorf oversees construction of the death camps, choosing the pesticide Zyklon B for mass extermination. Some of Karl’s sketches are discovered by the Nazis. Dorf has Karl and the other artists tortured, but they refuse to reveal where the rest of their sketches are. Dr. Weiss and the ghetto elders are ordered to select 6000 Jews a day for transport to Treblinka for extermination.