The making of the picture posed several problems. Perhaps foremost was the fact that the characters of the program were portrayed as blacks but were in fact entirely voiced by whites. This had posed no problem on the radio, but obviously would not be suitable for a movie where the actors could be seen as well as heard. Rather than hire black actors for the roles and instruct them to imitate to the maximum extent possible the very stereotypical voices used by the radio performers, program creators Freeman Gosden and Charles Correll performed the roles themselves in blackface.