Both actors who have played the character Allen(Phillip Seymour Hoffman, and Michael Kenneth Williams) died of drug overdoses.
In an interview with People magazine, Allison Janney said she and Michael Lerner were almost injured during the filming of their sex scene. "We had to have sex up against a wall and they started spraying us with glistening stuff to make us look sweaty, but no-one seemed to realise that we were standing on a marble floor. They said 'Action' and he pulled me up against the wall and his feet slipped out from under him and he went crashing down on the floor. It was terrible, but it was one of those moments I'll never forget."
Allison Janney had a clause in her contract stipulating that she would not do any nudity, but she choose to skip it for this movie because the nude moments she portrays she felt were really important for her character.