The events of the film unfold during the Great Patriotic War. Artists of a front actor's brigade are preparing a diversion behind enemy lines. The final chord of the performance should be a cello, which is stuffed with explosives. The playwright Leonid Kruchinin is willing to do anything to help the Red Army, but the only thing he is not willing to sacrifice is the actress Lara Vishnevskaya, a young star of the Soviet screen. So her role in this diversion keeps changing.