According to producer Pandro S. Berman, the filmmakers were aware that the picture was a "disaster" from the start, and were therefore stunned when audience preview cards came back raving about the talents of leading man Ivan Lebedeff, comparing him to Rudolph Valentino. Later he discovered that Lebedeff had in fact stolen the cards and written all the comments himself.
This was RKO's lowest-grossing film of the year, losing the studio $115,000 ($1.8M in 2018) according to studio records.
Despite being a box office lemon, small town Albion, New York's Rialto Theatre got many local merchants to do a newspaper tie-in with the movie during it's run there, with free tickets as a reward to shoppers. The single ads included clumsy headers like "THE GAY DIPLOMAT" KEEPS WARM WITH D & E COAL and COKE, and GAYER THAN THE "GAY DIPLOMAT" ARE OUR VALUES USED CAR SPECIALS for the local Dodge-Plymouth dealer. (Orleans Republican, ((Albion NY)) 18 November 1931)
By the date on the invitation Diana shows Ivan for his reception, this film takes place in July, 1916 - the month before Romania joins WWI on the side of the Allies.