With Warners firmly in the black by 1935, the studio turned much of its attention to “prestige” films. Warners' most ambitious venture into this area was the signing of the celebrated German theatre director Max Reinhardt for “a series of pictures.” As often happens with such a strange juxtaposition as that of Reinhardt and Hollywood the full intentions were never to be realized, but what did issue from the short-lived union was so stunning as to make it all worthwhile. In this case, what eventually emerged was an elaborate treatment of Shakespeare's “A Midsummer Night's Dream,” but not until the scrupulous, exacting Reinhardt had run up a huge production bill and obliged Warners to hire his loyal student, William Dieterle, to help him complete the project.

The result was a disturbing, original theatrical-cinematic work. The conception was Reinhardt's full-blown German Expressionism, the production was that of a major Hollywood studio at the height of its resourcefulness, the underlying interpretation was Shakespeare's Elizabethan romantic fantasy, the nominal subject was ancient Athenian legend. Out of these seemingly incompatible, competing world-views emerged, perhaps surprisingly, a coherent, even fantastic film. The large-scale ballet “dream” sequences, a collaboration of Reinhardt, the Ballet Mistress of the Paris Opera, Nijinska, and the cinematographic genius of Hal Mohr were the bizarre, shimmering set pieces of the film. Such unlikely casting as James Cagney as Bottom, Mickey Rooney as Puck, and Dick Powell as Lysander proved unexpectedly successful.