Katharine Hepburn's early career was marked by a series of pictures of such mediocrity that she was widely regarded as "Box Office Poison". One day, however, a writer named Cleveland Amory happened to notice a curiously flattering Hepburn profile in a Hartford newspaper.

Some time later, Amory encountered Kate's father, a Hartford urologist, and casually commented upon the apparent improvement in his daughter's treatment by the press. "Do you know what I do?" Dr. Hepburn suddenly asked. "No," Avery replied. "I specialize in what is known as the 'Old Man's Operation,'" he explained. "I have operated on half of the newspaper publishers of this city and I confidently expect to operate on the other half."

[Hepburn (who called many of her early films "boring") was so embarrassed by Sylvia Scarlett that she offered to make another film for free if RKO would agree to withhold its release. Her role? A young woman who dresses like a boy.]