Many of the locations used for filming were the actual locations Vincent van Gogh visited in his life.
In his memoir "The Ragman's Son" Kirk Douglas recounted that John Wayne attended a screening of the film, and was horrified. "Christ, Kirk! How can you play a part like that? There's so few of us left. We got to play strong, tough characters. Not those weak queers," Wayne said. Douglas tried to explain, "It's all make-believe, John. It isn't real. You're not really John Wayne, you know." Wayne (born Marion Morrison) looked at him oddly, as if Douglas had betrayed him.
MGM originally bought the film as a vehicle for Spencer Tracy.
Even though many sources claim that Anthony Quinn won his Best Supporting Actor Oscar for appearing a short 8 minutes in the movie, his performance actually lasts 22 minutes and 40 seconds.
Director Vincente Minnelli was opposed to using CinemaScope as the aspect ration of the film, believing that it was inconsistent with the mostly intimate story that he wanted to tell, as well as with the Van Gogh works depicted from time to time, including the recreations of many of the sites (e.g., a cafe, a pool hall, or Van Gogh's bedroom in Arles) that ended up being depicted in Van Gogh's paintings. Minnelli lost that battle with the studio, but was successful in getting to use Ansco Color as his film stock, which was not as saturated a medium as Technicolor; Minnelli believed that it would better capture the darker moods of Van Gogh's life. Ansco Color, however, had already gone out of production in 1955 when filming took place, and Minnelli had to scrounge enough of the remaining film stock to make the movie, and then had to arrange special processing to develop the film as well.