The Barretts of Wimpole Street is a 1934 film detailing the real-life romance between poets Elizabeth Barrett (Norma Shearer) and Robert Browning (Fredric March), despite the opposition of her father, played by Charles Laughton. The film was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Picture. It was written by Ernest Vajda , Claudine West and Donald Ogden Stewart , from the play by Rudolph Besier . The film was directed by Sidney Franklin .