Genre	Crime :: Drama :: Film-Noir :: Mystery
Date Released	22 November 1940
Production	Bonneville Entertainment
Distribution	IMAX
Related Links	1940 Movies November 1940 Movies
	1940 Crime Movies 1940 Drama Movies 1940 Film-Noir Movies 1940 Mystery Movies
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Quotes

Leslie: With all my heart, I still love the man I killed.

Robert Crosbie: If you love a person, you can forgive anything.

Robert Crosbie: I`ll do whatever you think is right. Howard Joyce: I don`t think it`s right, but I think it`s expedient. Juries can sometimes be very stupid, and it`s just as well not to worry them with more evidence than they can conveniently deal with.

Howard Joyce: Strange that a man can live with a woman for ten years and not know the first thing about her.

Trivia

The ending is different from the original play because the Production Code refused to allow a film let one of its characters be seen to get away with adultery and murder.

Merle Oberon and Walter Huston had starred in a Lux Radio Theatre version two years before.

Previously filmed as an early silent film starring Jeanne Eagels, The Letter (1929). Herbert Marshall, who plays the husband in this film, portrayed the lover in that version.

* * Cecil Kellaway is listed in the credits but can only be glimpsed in a long shot during a party scene. His scenes were drastically cut for the final release print.

Jack L. Warner originally asked William Wyler to test James Stephenson for the role of the lawyer. Wyler was surprised at how suited Stephenson was for the part and then was astonished when Warner balked at casting him, worrying about the stock player`s lack of name recognition. Wyler insisted on keeping him, putting him in the odd position of having to fight to cast an actor that Warner had originally suggested.

Sixteen years after he directed this film, William Wyler made his TV directing debut with a live production broadcast Oct. 15, 1956 on "Producers` Showcase: The Letter (#3.2)" (1956). The cast included Siobhan McKenna, John Mills, Michael Rennie, and Anna May Wong in the roles earlier played by Bette Davis, Herbert Marshall, James Stephenson, and Gale Sondergaard. Some of the censorship that had restricted the 1940 version was eased for this TV version. For example, Hammond`s "Eurasian wife" in 1940 was permitted to be, as in the play and 1929 film, his Chinese mistress.

See also Trivia Index (T) :: Quotes Index (T) :: Connections Index (T)

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