This was reportedly one of Sir Alfred Hitchcock's unhappiest directing jobs. He felt caught between Charles Laughton and Laughton's business partners. Later, he said that he did not so much direct this movie as referee it.
This was the first of three Daphne Du Maurier novels that Sir Alfred Hitchcock made into films. The other two were Rebecca (1940) and The Birds (1963).
In a 1972 interview with Pia Lindström, Sir Alfred Hitchcock said that it took one full morning to get one close-up of Charles Laughton. He also said that "He was a nice man. A charming man. He really was. But oh! He suffered so much, because he felt he couldn't get it out, and we were one whole morning on the one close-up until he got up, and he was crying in the corner, and I went over and patted him on the shoulder."
In an interview with François Truffaut, Sir Alfred Hitchcock said about this movie, "Although it became a box-office hit, I'm still unhappy over it." It made a profit of $3.7 million.