Frank Capra is now one of the most recognizable names of the early Hollywood era, but at the time of It Happened One Night's release, he had not yet established his credentials. A scrappy lover of film, who slowly worked his way to the director's chair after a series of menial roles in film production, Capra brought his uniquely positive and patriotic perspective to the production of It Happened One Night. While neither Clark Gable nor Claudette Colbert were his first choice—and they each allegedly had some issues with the script—the resulting film that they all created has become the quintessential American romantic comedy, and its success with critics and at the Academy Awards established Capra as a superlative film director.
After coming across the short story "Night Bus" by Samuel Hopkins Adams in a copy of Cosmopolitan, Capra requested that his studio, Columbia, buy the rights for it. He began immediately adapting the story into a film with the help of Robert Riskin, but found that very few people put much stock in the film's prospects. The four-week shoot was not entirely comfortable, as both Clark Gable and Claudette Colbert wanted changes to the script. Capra was smart to believe his stars, and they all collaboratively set to work retooling the dialogue. Given that Colbert had already worked with Capra on a previous flop, and given the state of the economy (the film was released in the midst of the Great Depression), she and Clark Gable did not have high hopes for the film's success.
The film's release would prove its stars wrong, however. After some initially modest box office success and mixed reviews from critics, the film began to receive more and more acclaim and it received a number of awards at the 1934 Academy Awards. Capra took home an award for Best Director, and earned his place among Hollywood's elite directors. At the time of its release, the New York Daily News wrote, "The direction is excellent. Frank Capra never lets his picture lag for a moment."
