Update: some of the "lost" footage of the prologue has been found, both sound and picture, and this includes footage apparently not included in the Turner Classic Movies (TCM) edition of the film. Some of this once-lost footage is included in A&E's
The Great Ziegfeld (1996)
and a few scenes from this footage are now included in the three-part PBS documentary Broadway: The American Musical (2004). The discovered footage includes Jules Bledsoe singing "Ol' Man River" with the
Dixie Jubilee Singers in full costume. Also featured on this "Biography" episode were scenes of Tess Gardella singing "C'mon Folks" and
Helen Morgan singing "Bill." All of these scenes survive in only faintly tolerable sound and picture quality, but at least they survive.
The "miscegenation" sequence, so important to the novel, the stage musical, the two later film versions, and the 1989 taped TV version, was considered too controversial to retain in this film version.
This was the first film to use Foley effects (specially created sound effects) on its soundtrack. The technique was named after Jack Foley, who performed the necessary sound effects while watching the film on playback. The process is still used on all films made today, and the effects artists who create the needed effects (such as footsteps, performed in synch with the image) are known as Foley artists.
Due to the unavailability of this film, several film reference books for years erroneously reported several wrong items about it, until the 1977 publication of Miles Kreuger's scrupulously researched and very accurate "Show Boat: The Story of a Classic American Musical". Among the erroneous facts perpetrated about the 1929 film: 1) that Charles Winninger , the original Cap'n Andy in the stage version of the musical, played Cap'n Andy in this film (Otis Harlan plays the role; Winninger plays it in the 1936 film version), 2) that Helen Morgan, the original Julie in the stage version of "Show Boat", plays Julie in this film (Ms. Morgan appears only in the sound prologue and Alma Rubens plays the role in the actual film; Ms. Morgan does play the role in the 1936 film version) 3) that Billy Rose wrote all the songs heard in the 1929 film (he wrote only one).
When MGM decided to produce a full-fledged remake, Show Boat (1951), the studio purchased the prints and negatives of Universal Pictures' two previous film versions of the property and ceased further distribution of both so as not to compete with the remake's box office take. The 1929 part-talkie was, for decades, believed to be lost and did not resurface until its laserdisc release in the 1990s with the legendary Ziegfeld prologue surviving only in audio form. The faithful, highly regarded 1936 version was unable to be seen for thirty years, turning up in the mid-1980s on the early cable television network Wometco Home Theater and finding its way to videocassette shortly thereafter.