After Nina Leeds finds out that insanity runs in her husband's family, she has a love child with a handsome doctor and lets her husband believes the child is his.
Acting
Shearer's face does three acts of tragedy without a single word.
Direction
Leonard turns stagey interior monologues into feverish close-ups.
Director
Robert Z. Leonard
Trivia, insights & behind the scenes
The film adapts Eugene O'Neill's nine-act play using voiceover 'thoughts'—a technique so novel audiences reportedly hissed at early screenings, confused by actors speaking without moving their lips.
Gable took this role only after being told he'd play a doctor, not realizing he'd spend half the film as 'the other man'—the scandal made him suddenly viable for leading-man casting.
US
