PRODUCTION
Production Company: MGM
Producers: Tod Browning, Irving Thalberg

SCRIPT
Script: Willis Goldbeck, Leon Gordon, Edgar Allan Woolf, Al Boasberg, John L. Balderston (uncredited)
Novel: Spurs by Tod Robbins

DIRECTION
Director: Tod Browning
Assistant Director: Will Sheldon

PHOTOGRAPHY
Director of Photography: Merritt B. Gerstad

EDITING AND POST PRODUCTION
Editor: Basil Wrangell

SOUND
Sound: Gavin Burns

DESIGN AND SET CONSTRUCTION
Art Director: Cedric Gibbons

CAST
Wallace Ford (Phroso)
Olga Baclanova (Cleopatra)
Harry Earles (Hans)
Daisy Earles (Frieda)
Leila Hyams (Venus)
Roscoe Ates (Roscoe)
Henry Victor (Hercules)
Rose Dione (Madame Tetrallini)
Daisy Hilton, Violet Hilton (Siamese twins)
Schlitze (herself)
Josephine Joseph (half woman / half man)
Johnny Eck (half boy)
Frances O'Connor (armless girl)
Peter Robinson (human skeleton)
Olga Roderick (bearded lady)
Koo Koo (herself)
Prince Randian (the living torso)
Martha Morris (armless girl)
Zip and Pip (pinheads)
Elizabeth Green (bird girl)
Angelo Rossito (Angeleno)
Edward Brophy, Matt McHugh (Rollo brothers)
Michael Visaroff (gamekeeper)
Ernie Adams (sideshow patron - uncredited)
Louise Beavers (maid - uncredited)
Albert Conti (landowner - uncredited)
Tom London (uncredited)
Michael Visaroff (Jean the caretaker - uncredited)

A travelling sideshow boasts a collection of human oddities paraded for public spectacle as freaks. One of them, the midget Hans, is madly in love with the gold-digging trapeze artist Cleopatra who is interested in him only because he's saved a small fortune. Cleopatra and her lover, strongman Hercules, plan to have her marry Hans so that she will be left the money in his will. But at the wedding reception, Cleopatra is revolted by Hans' friends in the sideshow who just want to accept her as one of their own. The angry freaks take revenge on the scheming Cleopatra and Hercules in the most horrific way imaginable...

A beautiful and shocking film that retains its power to simultaneously appall and enthrall even now. The climactic shots of the vengeful freaks slithering through the mud and rain in search of Cleopatra and Hercules is indelibly etched into the memory of anyone who's seen it and our last glimpse of the ill-fated Cleopatra is a surreal, nightmarish classic. As much a plea for tolerance and understanding as it is a horror film, this is a sensitive but powerful film that more than deserves its venerated status as a classic.

USA
Theatrical Distributor: MGM
Video Distributor: MGM / UA Home Video
Laserdisc Distributor: MGM Home Video (ML 100843); MGM / UA Home Video (ML 104507)