Development In 1931, Hollywood studios released three horror films that were hits:
Universal's
Dracula (1931) and
Frankenstein (1931); and
Paramount's
Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde (1931). Paramount's film's Mr. Hyde resembles a monstrous ape who has implied sexual relations with a sex worker Ivy; the studio wanted to make a follow-up with more horrific and sexual themes. On June 1, 1931, Paramount paid $15,000 () for the rights to
H. G. Wells' novel
The Island of Dr. Moreau (1896) and sent a copy of the novel to the
Motion Picture Producers and Distributors Association of America (MPPDA). Along with the novel, Paramount had access to an unproduced play by Frank Vreeland that was based on Wells' story and titled
His Creatures. Several writers attempted to work on the film's screenplay; these included
Joseph Moncure March, who wrote the novel-length poem
The Wild Party and the screenplay for ''
Hell's Angels (1930); Cyril Hume, the screenwriter of Tarzan the Ape Man (1932) and later Forbidden Planet (1956); Garrett Fort, whose credits included work on Dracula
and Frankenstein
; and Philip Wylie, whose 1930 novel Gladiator was one of the main inspirations for the Superman'' comics. Fort and Wylie developed an original character, the Panther Woman—a creature Dr. Moreau creates in his House of Pain and tries to mate with a human. In one of Wylie's and Fort's early adaptations, Moreau beats the half-naked Panther Woman because instead of having sex with a younger male, the Panther Woman violently slashes him. Their adaptation had a far-more-gruesome ending that involved Moreau taking the novel's character Prendick to see a chained, faceless creature; Moreau, who is planning to kill Prendick, slices off his face and sews it onto the creature. The final, highly revised script is dated September 30, 1932, and gives credit only to Wylie and
Waldemar Young. Young had written
Lon Chaney silent melodramas such as
London After Midnight (1927). Paramount sent their script to the MPPDA on September 22, 1932, noting the film was set to start shooting on September 26. Filming was delayed as the writers continued working on the script.
Pre-production ,
Gail Patrick and
Verna Hillie, finalists in Paramount Pictures' "Panther Woman" contest To cast the Panther Woman, Paramount publicist
Arthur Mayer developed a contest that involved giving the winner a trip to Hollywood, $200 () a week for five weeks, a home at the Ambassador Hotel, and a role in the film. Contestants were required to be between the ages of 17 and 30 years old, to be in good health, between and tall, and not have worked, or be related to anyone who had worked, at Paramount. In his memoir
Merely Colossal (1953), Mayer stated newspapers that were cooperating with Paramount on the project received floods of letters for the role. The contest attracted around 60,000 applicants. There were four finalists;
Lona Andre,
Gail Patrick,
Kathleen Burke, and
Verna Hillie. According to Hillie, who was living in Detroit, Paramount had published the content in several major city newspapers. Hillie was performing on radio at the time, and her mother submitted her for the contest. When Paramount contacted Hillie, she appeared as one of the 12 finalists in different theaters in Detroit on three succeeding Saturday nights. Each week a few of the finalists were eliminated from the contest. Audiences would privately vote for the performer they liked best, and Hillie won her spot in Detroit. As production was set to start, the four finalists of the Panther Woman contest arrived in Hollywood. According to historian Gregory Mank, early publicity photographs make the winners look "less like
vamps, as they do like classmates at a convent school". The judges of the contest's final were
Cecil B. DeMille,
Rouben Mamoulian,
Ernst Lubitsch,
Norman Taurog,
Stuart Walker, and
Erle C. Kenton. On September 29, two days before production was set to begin, Kathleen Burke was summoned to the casting office and told she had won the contest. Hillie, Andre, and Patrick also received Paramount contracts. Charles Laughton, who portrays Dr. Moreau in the film, had performed on stage in New York in 1931 and Paramount requested him to travel to Hollywood in early 1932. Paramount did not yet have a film ready for him, leading Laughton to appear in Universal's
The Old Dark House (1932). On June 19,
The New York Times announced Laughton would play the starring role in
Island on Lost Souls. Prior to working on the film, Laughton worked on Paramount's
Devil and the Deep (1932) and
Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer's
Payment Deferred (1932). To prepare for the role of Moreau, Laughton practiced using a
bullwhip, which he had already used in the play
A Man with Red Hair; his beard was inspired by a doctor Laughton had visited. Laughton was paid $2,250 per week for his work on the film. On July 31,
Los Angeles Times wrote that
Nancy Carroll and
Randolph Scott, who were both under contract to Paramount, were to portray Ruth and Edward Parker, respectively; these roles later went to
Richard Arlen and
Leila Hyams. Among the extra actors were wrestlers
Hans Steinke—who was known as The German Oak—and Harry Ezekian, who wrestled under the name Ali Baba. Steinke was cast as a beast-man and Ezekian as Gola. Director Norman Taurog, who won the
Academy Award for Best Director for
Skippy (1931), was initially going to direct
Island of Lost Souls. On September 20, 11 days before production on the film was set to begin,
Variety wrote that Paramount was "having trouble injecting comedy into
Island of Lost Souls" and had Taurog replaced by
Erle C. Kenton. Kenton's cinematographer was
Karl Struss, who won the
Academy Award for Best Cinematography for
F. W. Murnau's
Sunrise: A Song of Two Humans (1927). Struss spoke positively about his relationship with Kenton, who he said had "a greater command of the English language than anyone I ever worked with".
Filming Filming of
Island of Lost Souls was set up to start on October 1, 1932, with a 28-day production schedule. Some actors, such as
Tetsu Komai as M'ling the "Dog Man" who—as the September-30 shooting script stated, the role was as of yet uncast—were last-minute additions to the cast. Laughton, Arlen, Hyams, and Hohl went to
Catalina Island for one week of location work. Some footage was filmed on
SS Catalina which, according to Struss, had encountered real fog as called for in the script. During a scene, one of the extras who was dressed as a beast-man reportedly got too close to the bars of a tiger's cage, leading to the tiger nearly tearing his arm from its socket. The fate of the man is unknown but Laughton's wife
Elsa Lanchester confirmed this story, recalling the incident shocked Laughton and others on the set. Waldemar Young continued working on the script after filming began, and Emjou Basshe worked on the screenplay from September 19 throughout filming. After production was complete,
The Pittsburgh Press published excerpts of the diary Burke kept during production. After her first day of filming, Burke wrote: "I wish I could go to sleep. I feel lonesome". Her second entry noted she was excited to film and that Kenton had asked her to slow her movements because she moved too quickly on set. A later entry said Kenton was very patient with Burke on set but that she was "so tired, I hardly could walk". It was announced Burke was going on a promotional tour for
Island of Lost Souls after production, to which she responded to in her diary: "I'm going to be scared to death—trip over carpets, fall into the footlights or the bass drum or something. But, of course, it's an honor, and I'm going to do my best". On set, Burke's boyfriend from Chicago, Glen Rardin, began following her to work each day. The continuous visits led to a fist fight between Rardin and director Kenton. On October 14, the
Hollywood Citizen-News wrote that Paramount had added
Bela Lugosi to the film's cast. Mank noted newspapers were often late in publishing casting information but that because this is the earliest note of Lugosi's casting, he was cast after the film started shooting. On October 17, Lugosi declared bankruptcy, having lost most of his money to friends after achieving popularity in
Dracula, and signed on to the film for a salary of $875 (). Lugosi replaced
George Barbier as the Sayer of the Law. Filming ended in early November 1932. Kenton filmed retakes of the scene of Ruth (Hyams) with Ouran (Steinke) on December 8. ==Release==