This was first film to shoot in New York City after the September 11, 2001 attack on the World Trade Center. Specifically the second week of October 2001.
The glass featured as "Deep South Glass" is actually hand-blown glass made by Simon Pearce, a Vermont company named after Simon Pearce, who emigrated to the United States from Waterford, Ireland.
Jake's plane lands on Lake Peachtree in Peachtree City, Georgia. It is illegal to land a plane on Lake Peachtree, and the Peachtree City Police issued the production company a $300 ticket.
Charlize Theron was originally cast as Melanie Carmichael. Due to the actor's strike, she jumped to a ready-to-go movie, Mauvais piège (2002). Reese Witherspoon was cast the same weekend that her previous film, La Revanche d'une blonde (2001), opened.
The coon dog cemetery in the film is a real place in Tuscumbia, Alabama. The northern Alabama town is the childhood home of Helen Keller, whose story was told in Miracle en Alabama (1962).
Keni Thomas: lead singer of the band Cornbread that plays in the fair scene. He's a real-life survivor of Task Force Ranger, and is portrayed in the film La Chute du faucon noir (2001) (the trooper with the inhaler).