The film was produced by MGM with a budget of $ 1,300,000 in the silent version, then voiced with the Western Electric System. It had been thought of as the first feature of the Metro in color, shot with the system Technicolor 2-strip.

The production of the film, which began in 1926, was interrupted several times before it could complete the film. Several problems arose, including the advent of sound that first slowed and then working to get even block it. The film, in fact, was released just three years after the first take. The scenes filmed by Maurice Tourneur and Benjamin Christensen in 1927 were incorporated in the final version of 1929.