After Richard Basehart's character of Quimby decides to create another identity for himself, he gets the idea for the name Sothern when he sees a movie fan magazine with Ann Sothern on the cover. "Tension" producer Robert Sisk was then in the process of prepping Shadow on the Wall (1950) to star Miss Sothern in the last film of her long-term MGM contract.
Portions of André Previn's music score were recycled as title theme for same studio's Cat on a Hot Tin Roof (1958).
According to studio records, this film lost $229,000 for MGM (over $3M in 2025).
Audrey Totter was promised top-billing by the producer, but after Richard Basehart was borrowed from Fox to play her husband, his studio demanded that he get top billing as a condition of the agreement.
This movie was shot about the same time in 1949 as Side Street (1949), and the latter film utilizes the pharmacy set and its phone booth to allow Farley Granger to make a phone call.