“The role of Sadie Thompson should have died with Jeanne Eagels,” wrote Mollie Merrick in the Los Angeles Times. “She could say more with those twitching calves than a whole world of actresses can do with makeup and costuming.” Hays approved the project only after Schenck agreed to change the cleric “Reverend Davidson” to the secular reformer “Mr. Davidson.” Walter Huston was cast as the man obsessed with a prostitute in a steamy Samoan hotel.
