The character of Owen Scudder, played by Lew Cody, may have been inspired by a real life bigamist and serial killer James 'Bluebeard' Watson (1870-1939). Watson traveled the United States under several aliases, marrying 19 different women between 1918 and 1920 and murdering at least nine of them for financial gain. He was apprehended in April, 1920, in Los Angeles.
This film offers behind-the-scenes footage of two legendary silent era director/performers at work: Charles Chaplin directing his comedy-drama L'opinion publique (1923) and Erich von Stroheim directing Les rapaces (1924).
Many Hollywood "behind the scenes" actions are shown, including Marshall Neilan directing The Eternal Three (1923) and Fred Niblo directing The Famous Mrs. Fair (1923). Both of these movies appear lost, so this may be the only extant footage of them.
Thought to have been a "lost" film, copies began to be found in the 1980s and 1990s in various states of quality. In 2005, MGM partnered with Turner Classic Movies to restore the film and it premiered on TCM on January 24, 2006 with a new score and title cards.
The large dollar bills that Miss Tweedy shows Scudder are nicknamed "horse blankets" or "blanket notes". In 1928, the Secretary of the Treasury directed that paper currency be reduced in size by 25% in order to save costs. The new bills could be printed 12 to a sheet, rather than 8 to a sheet for the old size.