The movie was nearly banned when first released in the United States. It wasn't until the First Lady of the state of New York (at the time) Eleanor Roosevelt saw the importance of the movie that the ban was not implemented.
The Nazi regime tried to burn all the copies of this movie. They couldn't, as prints had been distributed around the world, including the United States and Japan and many other nations, by the time they came to power in January 1933.
Hertha Thiele and Dorothea Wieck, playing the student-teacher duo Manuela and Bernburg respectively, were actually both born in 1908, with Wieck being just 4 months older.
Christa Winsloe, whose play and novel this film is based on, was assassinated by a Gestapo agent in 1944, while hiding in the south of France.
Voted Number 9 on Film Daily's Ten Best Pictures of 1933. (It appears on the 1933 list because that is when it was released in the USA.)