Trivia

This was the first film in which Lionel Barrymore played gruff-voiced but soft-hearted Dr. Gillespie. One of MGM studio chief Louis B. Mayer's favorite actors, the irascible Barrymore was cast in this role after he had played Judge Hardy in the first of the studio's Andy Hardy movies, A Family Affair. Mayer was determined that, as long as he lived, Barrymore would be employed by the studio and after his health confined him to a wheelchair, the part of Gillespie was re-written to accommodate Barrymore's condition. He would go on to play Gillespie in 14 more films.

This was the first film in which Lionel Barrymore was wheelchair-bound, which is one reason why he and Lew Ayres appeared briefly after the end credits (Barrymore referred to the "contraption" he was sitting in). He had a history of arthritis in his hip, then broke the hip in 1936 when a drawing table fell on him and again in 1937 after he tripped over a cable while filming Saratoga (1937). For a few films, his character either sat or was on crutches, but the pain was so intense while filming You Can't Take It with You (1938) on crutches that he required hourly injections of pain killers. He used a wheelchair almost exclusively for the rest of his life.

This was the first film in what would prove to be one of MGM's most enduring (and profitable) franchises. In fact, the Kildare movies proved so popular that the studio continued making them even after Lew Ayres was written out of them, after he refused to serve in World War II by registering as a conscientious objector. Fearing a fierce public backlash, MGM shifted the focus of all the following films to Lionel Barrymore's character, Dr. Gillespie. Though their popularity began to fade, six more films were made before the series ended in 1943.

First film in MGM's long-running Dr. Kildare franchise. The studio would eventually produce 14 more films featuring some or all of the characters seen here, and in the 1960s remade this same material as a popular TV series starring Richard Chamberlain in the title role and Raymond Massey as Dr. Gillespie.

Feature directorial debut of Harold S. Bucquet.