Co-stars Carroll O'Connor and Ernest Borgnine would eventually have the shared distinction that for each, one of their most popular roles had been originated by Rod Steiger. In the live TV anthology series The Philco Television Playhouse (1948), Steiger had first played the role of Marty Pilletti in Marty (1953), later played by Borgnine winning the Best Actor Academy Award for Marty (1955). Steiger would later win his own Best Actor Academy Award for playing Chief Bill Gillespie in In the Heat of the Night (1967), a role that--when the movie was adapted as the long-running TV series In the Heat of the Night (1988), starting its run more than two decades after the original film--would be played by O'Connor, that casting occurring 14 years after this film, at a time when O'Connor was already at his peak of popularity with another iconic television role, that of Archie Bunker on All in the Family (1971).
Leslie Ackerman's debut.
Though she appears uncredited, Shirley Stoler from 'Honeymoon Killers' and 'Seven Beauties' appears in the early Town Hall meeting.