Trivia for
Rasputin and the Empress (1932) More at IMDbPro »

• Dr. William Axt, MGM's musical director, brought together all the Greek and Russian church choirs in Los Angeles to sing at the celebration mass at the start of the movie.
  
  
• The model for Princess Natasha in the movie was Princess Irina Romanoff Youssoupoff, who filed a lawsuit against MGM in 1933, claiming invasion of privacy and libel in portraying her as a mistress of Grigory Rasputin. She won an award of $127,373 in an English court and an out-of-court settlement with MGM, reportedly of $250,000, in New York. As a result of the success of Princess Youssoupoff's lawsuit against MGM over this movie, Hollywood studios began inserting the disclaimer "This motion picture is a work of fiction..." in the credits of every film.
  
  
• Upon its initial release in 1932, the movie was the subject of a lawsuit issued by Prince Feliks Yusupov, who had actually been involved in the death of the real Grigory Rasputin. Although names in the film were changed (Yusupov's character, as portrayed by John Barrymore, was called Prince "Paul Chegodieff"), Yusupov recognized Diana Wynyard's character of "Princess Natasha" to be that of his wife, Princess Irina. Yussoupov sued for libel as a result of a scene which suggested that his wife had been raped by Rasputin. MGM lost the suit, and the scene was cut, which rendered Wynyard's character somewhat incomprehensible if the viewer of the film is not aware of this cut - in the first half of the film, Princess Natasha is a supporter of Rasputin, and in the second half she is extremely afraid of him, for no apparent reason. The laserdisc release of this film includes the original theatrical trailer, which contains a portion of this deleted scene.
  
  
• The only film in which all three Barrymore siblings - John Barrymore, Ethel Barrymore and Lionel Barrymore - appeared together.
  
  
• Irving Thalberg fired writer Mercedes de Acosta when she refused to write a scene involving a meeting between 'Gregory Rasputin' and Princess Irene Yusupov, which she knew did not occur. Prince Feliks Yusupov, one of Rasputin's assassins, was a close friend of de Acosta. After her firing, the scene was added. After the film's release, Prince Yusupov sued Thalberg and MGM, as de Acosta warned he would.
  
  
• Charles Brabin was originally assigned to direct, but was taken off the project after several run-ins with Ethel Barrymore, who condescendingly referred to him as "Mr. Theda Bara." Brabin was married to the silent screen legend Theda Bara. Richard Boleslawski was brought in to direct and given sole directorial credit, although several of Brabin's scenes remain in the finished film.
  
  
• Ethel Barrymore's only starring role in a motion picture with sound.
  
  
• Annoyed that his brother John was trying to show him up by placing his hand on hand him while he was finishing a scene (an ancient actors technique for drawing attention to himself), Lionel Barrymore excused himself from the set and went to the back lot to find a telephone. He then phoned the set and told director Richard Boleslawski that "he'd better advise Mr. 'John Barrymore' to not place his hand on me at the close of this scene, lest I lay one on him". When Lionel returned to the set he advised John to keep his hands to himself.
  
  
• Ethel Barrymore (Tsarina Alexandra) plays the lover of her real life brother Lionel Barrymore (Grigori Rasputin) in this film.
  
  
• MGM purchased stock footage of the Romanov family and Russian military parades from J. Stuart Blackton, who had this footage as part of a vast stock footage library.
  
  

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