Trivia

Renée Adorée was cast at the insistence of her friend and frequent costar Ramon Novarro, who probably didn't know how ill she was with tuberculosis. She suffered two hemorrhages during production which almost shut the project down. After one setback, Novarro tried to convince production supervisor Hunt Stromberg to relieve her of her duties and re-shoot her material with another actress, offering to waive his salary, but Stromberg insisted, against doctor's orders, that it would be too expensive. After completing her last scene, Adorée had a second hemorrhage again and lost consciousness; she was rushed to a sanitarium in La Crescenta, California. Although Adorée survived two more years, her health effectively ended her chances at a continued career. Call of the Flesh (1930) was her last film.

None of the Technicolor sequences, as described in the New York Times review in October 1930, originally totaling 720 feet (220 m), (approximately eight minutes), including at least one aria (Vesti la Giubba from Pagliacci) by Ramon Novarro, seem to have survived; they were missing from the 100-minute print telecast by TBS in 1988-1989 and by Turner Classic Movies at various times between 1997 and 2020.

This film marked Ramon Novarro's fourth film appearance with Renée Adorée, and his third with Dorothy Jordan. Charles Brabin had been the original director on Ben-Hur: A Tale of the Christ (1925) starring Novarro before Brabin had been fired from that project; however, the firing had taken place before Novarro's hiring, and the two had thus not worked together on that film. Novarro would later claim that he, not Brabin, actually directed most of Call of the Flesh (1930).

A February 16, 1931 article in the Republican-Journal of Ogdensburg, NY mentions the film was the first "talkie" shown at the St. Lawrence State Hospital. Both patients and hospital staff watched it, along with a newsreel and a comedy, in an auditorium filled to capacity on Sunday, February 15, 1931.

The only film in which Renée Adorée, a onetime professional dancer, performed a dance number. Sadly she was in poor health and it shows in her labored footwork. A double was used for a couple of long shots.