The Lower Depths was adapted as a Chinese film entitled Ye 'dian or Night Lodging in 1948. It was first performed on stage in 1946. Both stage and screen versions were banned in China during the Cultural Revolution.

In 1957, Akira Kurosawa directed a Japanese film adaptation of The Lower Depths (translated as Donzoko) starring Toshiro Mifunge.

In 1936, Jean Renoir directed a French film adaptation of The Lower Depths entitled Les Bus, or The Underworld. At the time the film was made, the French social climate resembled pre-Revolutionary Russia in its Utopian yearnings.