When Muni delivers the last line of the film in darkness, critics hailed the fade-out as a masterpiece of direction; in fact it was an accident of lighting, due to an equipment failure.

The film was banned in Georgia upon release, and the State Prison Commission tried unsuccessfully to sue Warner Bros. for libel, over the content of this film.

Warner’s use of Paul Muni for its big biopics of the thirties led Hal B. Wallis – head of production at the studio – to remark, ‘Every time Paul Muni parts his beard and looks down a microscope, this company loses two million dollars.’

In 1941 Warners’ rejected Muni’s pitch to make a Beethoven biopic, and in response he refused to make High Sierra, a part which instead made a star of Humphrey Bogart.