In September 1941, Gary Cooper, Barbara Stanwyck and Edward Arnold reprised their roles from Meet John Doe for a 30 minute radio version broadcast on The Screen Guild Theatre.

During production, Frank Capra and Robert Riskin had discussed making a sequel, The Further Adventures of John Doe. When the film's tax problems forced them to dissolve Frank Capra Productions, those plans were scrapped.

Warner Bros. spoofed the film's title in the 1941 animated film "Meet John Doughboy." The cartoon was a series of sight gags about the military presented by Porky Pig and bore no relationship to the Frank Capra film beyond its plot.

One myth attached to Meet John Doe is that nine minutes were cut from it after its initial release. The film's original publicity indicated it was 132 minutes long, while most surviving prints were 123 minutes. Historians looked for the missing nine minutes for years until an original fine grain negative turned up with a running time of 123 minutes. Apparently, the longer running time was a typo.

Eager to get involved in the war effort and, according to some sources, tired of Capra's taking most of the credit for their work together, Riskin ended their collaboration after Meet John Doe. When Riskin informed him that he wanted to work on other projects than those they had planned together, Capra became quite bitter toward his former partner. At one point, he said, "Those damn writers shouldn't be making pictures."

By 1945 ownership of Meet John Doe had reverted to Capra and Riskin. They sold the film to an independent distributor, Goodwill Pictures, for $150,000. When that company failed to renew their copyright, the film reverted to the public domain. Goodwill also allowed the camera negative to deteriorate, leaving most prints of the film in bad condition. In the '70s, the American Film Institute restored the film from two surviving nitrate prints and Warner Bros.' studio print. That version is currently stored in the Library of Congress.

Remakes of Meet John Doe were announced by United Artists in 1962 and Columbia Pictures Television in 1982, but nothing came of either project.

A 1989 Indian film, Main Azaad Hoon, borrowed plot elements from Meet John Doe with a story about a female reporter who invents stories about a common man fighting political corruption who eventually decides to commit suicide. This film used the ending Capra did not dare use, with the John Doe character throwing himself from an unfinished skyscraper at the end.

A musical version of Meet John Doe played briefly at Washington, DC's, Ford Theater in 2007.

by Frank Miller

SOURCES:
Frank Capra: The Catastrophe of Success by Joseph McBride