Bela Lugosi filmed this Columbia feature August 21-September 1943, prior to his final two Monogram films. This was also the last time he would receive top billing for a major Hollywood studio.
According to "The Films of Bel Lugosi", Columbia grossed close to half a million dollars on this film on an investment of $75,000.
Columbia originally intended this film as a direct sequel to Dracula, but when Universal threatened them with a plagiarism suit, Columbia went ahead and made the film anyway but changed the names of the characters to avoid any connection with "Dracula". They also held back its release for two months so as not to compete with Lon Chaney's "Son of Dracula."
Lugosi was paid $3,500 for his four weeks of work.
Matt Willis' make-up was reused by Columbia make-up man Clay Campbell on Steven Ritch in 1956's "The Werewolf."
The action of the prologue takes place beginning 15 October 1918, while the balance of the film takes place in late summer, early autumn of 1940 (according the the Regent Hall concert program shown).
The Columbia Gower studios were rather cramped so the production moved to Fine Arts Studio for the cemetery sequence.
The text of Tesla's book as shown is: "THE SUPERNATURAL AND ITS MANIFESTATIONS By Dr. Armand Tesla. From the beginning of time, man has been troubled by the uncertainty of death and by the rare and horrible manifestations which occur at intervals in which the dead are known to return from their grave. Such people are known as vampires or werewolves. Scientific men throughout the ages have endeavored to delve into the mystery that has baffled them The most ancient writings have mentioned this strange phenomenon and it has always left the writer baffled. It is a known certainty that these beings do do return to earth and have been known to attack humans. They have at times left horrible marks of their visits. The victim of such an attack by the un-dead insists upon the memory of a horrible dream, or nightmare. In addition, there are lacerations about the size of pin-pricks, on the throat and an almost total absence of blood in the body. They strike with such suddenness that it has been impossible to locate their coming and going and it is usually a case of sudden death to the unfortunate victim.Some tribes have recorded the visits of these beings and scientific research has revealed them to be beyond the realm of superstition. From the beginning of time..." (text begins repeating at this point.)
This appears to be the first horror film ever made in which both a vampire and a werewolf are characters, anticipating Universal's House of Frankenstein (released 11 months later) and House of Dracula, as well as the the recent "Underworld" and "Twilight" movies.
This is possibly the first vampire film to actually show the vampire dissolve/disintegrate on camera.