he failed to bail out before the crash of a German Gotha bomber, piloted by Al Wilson, which had been doubled by Igor Sikorsky's Sikorsky S-29-A, his first biplane built after his arrival in the United States. In total, 137 pilots were used in filming the last major flying scene. Due to the delay while Hughes tinkered with the flying scenes, Whale managed to entirely shoot his film adaptation of Journey's End and release it a month before Hell's Angels was released; the gap between completion of the dialogue scenes and completion of the aerial combat stunts allowed Whale to be paid, sail back to England, and begin work on the subsequent project, making Hell's Angels, Whale's actual (albeit uncredited) cinema debut, but his second film to be released. With the majority of the film shot and in editing, Hughes realized a similar film, Darryl F. Zanuck's The Dawn Patrol, would become a competitor at the box office. After attempting to lease all available period aircraft to stall his competitor, Hughes brought a lawsuit through the Caddo Company and the Gainsborough Corporation, that alleged that the screenplay of Hell's Angels was plagiarized. The lawsuit resulted in The Dawn Patrol being rushed through post-production in order to be in theaters before Hell's Angels. In late 1930, Warner Bros. and Zanuck won the suit. The film was widely reported as being one of the most expensive films ever made, by contemporary sources, with a reputed budget of $4 million. However, this is a myth created by Hughes to publicise the film, and the accounts for Hell's Angels reveal that it in fact cost only $2.8 million, considerably less than the $4 million cost of Ben-Hur: A Tale of the Christ, released three years earlier. Reception Hell's Angels received its premiere at Grauman's Chinese Theatre in Hollywood on May 27, 1930. All the stars and makers of the film attended, as well as Cecil B. DeMille, Buster Keaton, Gloria Swanson, Dolores del Río, Loretta Young and Grant Withers, Norma Talmadge, Mary Pickford and Douglas Fairbanks, Billie Dove, Joe E. Brown, Joel McCrea, Bebe Daniels, Charles Farrell, Ruth Roland and Ben Bard, Mary Brian, Jackie Coogan, Sally Eilers and Hoot Gibson, Lawrence Tibbett, Sally Blane, Wheeler and Woolsey, Joseph Schildkraut, and Charlie Chaplin with his girlfriend Georgia Hale. A program with leather cover was designed for the premiere by famed aviation illustrator Clayton Knight.