The whole movie script fit on one page, where the sequence of episodes was recorded. The text was not written in advance, and the actors said what was appropriate for the situation.
The philosopher Nana meets in a café is the French philosopher and essayist Brice Parain, Jean-Luc Godard's former philosophy tutor.
The story being read to Nana is "The Oval Portrait" by Edgar Allan Poe. The voice of Jean-Luc Godard is dubbed onto the soundtrack when Nana's lover reads Poe's "The Oval Portrait".
Anna Karina's character states that she acted in a film with Eddie Constantine. Years later, Karina went on to star alongside Constantine in Agente Lemmy Caution: Missione Alphaville (1965), written and directed by Jean-Luc Godard.
Anna Karina plays Nana Kleinfrankenheim, who slips into prostitution. Émile Zola's 1880 novel "Nana" tells much the same story. Her surname means, in German, "home for small francs" or more idiomatically "place for loose change", which is a probable reference to her profession.