 One of MGM mogul Irving Thalberg (qv)s personal projects, this  originally began filming in Technicolor, with Paul Lukas (qv) as  Nikolai Nazaroff and Frank Morgan (I) (qv) as August Archipenko.  When Thalberg died, production was halted. When it was able to  resume, black and white was selected as a more economical format.  Lukas and Morgan were no longer available, so  John Barrymore (I) (qv) and Herman Bing (qv) took over their  roles.