Woody Allen once said of this film: "From the beginning, I had enormous reservations about doing a film which I had not written and over which I would have no directorial control. The reason I did Le prête-nom (1976) was that the subject was worthwhile. Martin Ritt and Walter Bernstein lived through the blacklist and survived it with dignity, so I didn't mind deferring to their judgment."
The character of Hecky Brown portrayed by Zero Mostel was loosely based on actor Philip Loeb who was a personal friend of Mostel who had been black-listed and later committed suicide.
Several people involved in this film were themselves on the McCarthy-era blacklists that it is about: director Martin Ritt; writer Walter Bernstein; and actors Zero Mostel, Herschel Bernardi, Lloyd Gough, and Joshua Shelley.
The writers in the deli, according to screenwriter Walter Bernstein, were a composite of himself, Abraham Polonsky, and Arnold Manoff. All three writers were blacklisted by Hollywood as a result of the anti-communist hysteria and House Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC) hearings. All three also co-wrote the segments for the 1950s TV series You Are There (1953).
Some movie posters for this film featured a long text preamble that read: "What if there were a list? A list that said: Our finest actors weren't allowed to act. Our best writers weren't allowed to write. Our funniest comedians weren't allowed to make us laugh. What would it be like if there were such a list? It would be like America in 1953."