MGM Studio's biggest money grosser of 1939, surpassing Das zauberhafte Land (1939) for that production year.
The parody sequence, "My Day," featuring Mickey Rooney as President Franklin D. Roosevelt and Judy Garland as First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt, was removed from the negative after the president's death on April 12, 1945. The routine, for many years thought to be lost, was rediscovered on 16-millimeter film and now can be viewed on Warner Home Video's DVD, "The Mickey Rooney & Judy Garland Collection."
Footage from earlier Mickey Rooney film, Broadway to Hollywood (1933), is seen to show flashbacks of Mickey Moran, Rooney's character, as a child performing in vaudeville.
The Mickey Rooney-Judy Garland-Busby Berkeley full-throttle production number, "God's Country" (music by Harold Arlen, lyrics by E.Y. Harburg), had been introduced on Broadway by Jack Whiting and The Five Reillys in the 1937 musical, "Hooray for What!" MGM bought the screen rights to the show, which never was filmed.
Mickey Rooney was 18 during filming and 19 when he was nominated for the Oscar, making him the second youngest person ever to be nominated for the Academy Award for Best Actor in a Leading Role.