This was the only film directed by playwright and stage director George S. Kaufman. He directed the film in the same manner that he directed in the theater, by closing his eyes and listening only to the actors speaking the dialogue, with no regard to how the scene looked. Since Kaufman knew nothing about the technical aspects of filmmaking, associate producer Gene Fowler Jr. looked after those issues, with Kaufman allowing Fowler to cut a take at his discretion if there was a technical problem.
The final of fourteen films pairing William Powell and Myrna Loy. Watch for her uncredited cameo as Mrs. Ashton.
This film had a difficult time getting approved by the censors in the Breen Office as it was called at the time. They objected to the "derogatory and ridiculous" portrayal of a United States Senator. Joseph Breen even went so far as to meet with executives at Universal to get them to scrap the picture altogether or at least make the main character a governor. The film was not approved until William Gordon, then head of publicity at Universal, pledged to personally review the script and remove any so-called objectionable material. It is not known how much he had to edit the screenplay, if at all.
Peter Lind Hayes receives an "and introducing" credit, even though he had been working in films since 1933.