When Fred Astaire learned that Gracie Allen was nervous about dancing with him on-stage, he reportedly made a point of tripping and falling in front of her the first day on the set to put her at her ease.
After learning that Fred Astaire wanted Burns and Allen to audition for him, George Burns hired a vaudeville dancer he knew to choreograph a complex routine with whisk brooms he had known from his earlier days. Astaire enjoyed the performance by Burns and Gracie Allen so much, that he insisted on working it into the film.
Joan Fontaine joked that this movie set her career back four years. At the premiere, a woman sitting behind her loudly exclaimed, "Isn't she awful!" during Fontaine's on-screen attempt at dancing.
First film for Fred Astaire at RKO without Ginger Rogers. They both agreed that after Ritmo loco (1937), their seventh film together in 3½ years, to take a break from working with each other. Rogers would go on to make Damas del teatro (1937) instead.
During the part of the "Stiff Upper Lip" number that takes place on a turntable, Fred Astaire and Gracie Allen perform the dance variously known as the "runaround", the "nut dance", or the "oompah trot", consisting of the dancers moving in a circle and doing walking steps in strict rhythm. This dance had been a trademark of Fred and his sister Adele Astaire on stage, but Astaire didn't do it in a film before this because he didn't think Ginger Rogers was right for it.