To get Dame Elizabeth Taylor to do the movie at a "bargain" salary, producer and director Peter Glenville told her that he had offered it to Sophia Loren. She promptly cut her customary $1 million salary in half and signed on.
Several critics noted that the ending of this movie is at least a little more positive and optimistic than the bleak ending of Graham Greene's original novel, and attacked the movie for "softening" the subject. Graham Greene, however, insisted that the more upbeat ending had been his own idea.
The Duvalier regime in Haiti was still active when this movie was made. "Papa Doc" Duvalier had accused Graham Greene of being a devil-worshipper when his novel was originally published, and the protracted filming of this movie was accompanied by several news stories about attempts to sabotage it, including some wild tales about voodoo "hexes" being placed on various people involved in this movie. However, filming was successfully completed, although this movie was poorly reviewed and proved, despite its starry cast, to be a box-office disaster. Peter Glenville never directed in the cinema again.
This is the first movie in which Richard Burton was paid more than his wife, Dame Elizabeth Taylor. Burton got $750,000, while Taylor, the first actress to receive a $1 million fee for a single movie, settled for a mere $500,000.