Stunt pilots refused to perform an aerial sequence that director Howard Hughes wanted. Hughes, a noted aviator himself, did his own flying. He got the shot, but he also crashed the plane.
More than 70 pilots were used in the film. Three of them died during shooting.
An eight-minute two-strip multi-color sequence remains the only surviving color footage of its star Jean Harlow.
The entire movie had been filmed as a silent, minus a soundtrack, by Howard Hughes in 1928. Greta Nissen had the role played later by Jean Harlow. When sound equipment became available, Hughes decided to re-shoot the whole film as a talkie.
This movie cost $3.95 million to make (equivalent to approximately $58 million in 2017), so expensive that it made no profit on its first release.