The role of the Duke was originally offered to Alec Guinness. When he turned it down, the role was offered to a further thirty-one actors, before Kenneth Colley finally accepted the part.
For the interview scenes, Desmond Davis decided to link them aesthetically and shot both in the same manner; Angelo was shot upwards from waist level to make him look large, Isabella was shot from further away so more background was visible in her shots, making her appear smaller. Gradually, the shots then move towards each other's style so that, by the end of the scene, they are both shot in the same framing.
Desmond Davis based the brothel in the play on a traditional Western saloon and the prison on a typical horror film dungeon.
The set for the episode was a 360-degree set backed by a cyclorama, which allowed actors to move from location to location without cutting - actors could walk through the streets of Vienna by circumnavigating the studio eight times.
Part of the long running BBC Television Shakespeare project which ran between 1978 and 1985.