The Pillowman is set in a totalitarian police state. Katurian Katurian is a writer who is best-known for his extremely dark and gruesome stories that often involve children. He has been called in for questioning in connection with the murder of three local children. The police officers in charge of him, Tupolski and Ariel, begin to lose their temper and use excessive force to try and get him to confess, but Katurian insists that he is innocent.
Everything changes when Katurian's brother, Michal, is brought into the mix. Michal has a mental disability because of abuse from their parents. In his short story “The Writer and the Writer's Brother,” Katurian tells the story of his adolescence and the torture of his brother Michal. Because of this torture, Katurian began to write gruesome and terrifying stories. In the present, Michal has also been called in for questioning by the police.
When Katurian is put in the same questioning room as Michal, Michal tells him that he committed the three murders, much to Katurian's surprise. They are now both set to be executed, which upsets Katurian, as he did not suspect his brother of having committed the murders. After telling the story of "The Pillowman," a large man made of pillows who convinces young children to commit suicide before they live out horrible lives, Katurian smothers Michal to save him from the violence of execution.
Tupolski and Ariel return and Katurian confesses to the murders of the children, on the condition that the policemen preserve his stories if he confesses. Katurian's confession soon falls apart, however, as he cannot recall the details of the murders he committed. It fully unravels when Ariel finds the third child, a little deaf girl who is not dead at all, but painted green and living in a small cottage happily. The policemen shoot Katurian in the head at the end of the play, but Ariel puts the author's stories in a file to save them.
