Viennese Nights - Production

Production

Viennese Nights was the first of four original screen musicals that the team of Sigmund Romberg and Oscar Hammerstein II were to create for Warner Brothers over a two-year period. There were to be paid $100,000 a piece per film against 25 percent of the profits. This deal was made early in 1930, before anyone realized that the Great Depression would be imminent later that year. These economic problems caused studios to stay away from the lavish spectacle of musicals which were now seen as frivolous and anachronistic. Under these circumstances, Warner Brothers were forced to buy out the contract they had signed with the Romberg-Hammerstein team, early in 1931, after their second musical Children of Dreams (1931), which had already been produced, had been released to dismal reviews.

The picture marked Broadway star Vivienne Segal's last starring role in a picture. Segal, who was a star on the stage, was trying to be groomed by Warner Brothers as a competitor to Paramount Pictures' Jeanette MacDonald. Segal's last picture was as a supporting player in MGM's The Cat and the Fiddle, ironically with MacDonald as the star. Viennese Nights also marked operetta singer Alexander Gray's last starring role in a feature.

Among the players, Bela Lugosi makes his first appearance in color in this feature in a bit part as a Hungarian ambassador named Count von Ratz. Lugosi's part was filmed before his claim to fame as the title role in Dracula for Universal Pictures.

Due to the lack of sets, a number of scenes were filmed at other studios, a common practice at that point. The climax of the picture, when the symphony is played, was shot on Universal Picture's Stage 28 theater set, originally built for the Lon Chaney picture The Phantom of the Opera. Viennese Nights marks the third time the set was photographed in Technicolor, the first two being Phantom and The King of Jazz.