The film was a revelation at the time of its release. The majority of the pre-1936 MGM film library had rarely been released to television, so clips from films such as Free and Easy (1930) and The Hollywood Revue of 1929 (1929) were shown for the first time since their original theatrical releases. For years, films such as Meet Me in St. Louis (1944) and An American in Paris (1951) had only been shown via worn, badly spliced prints late at night on independent TV stations. For this film, the vintage footage was meticulously restored and remastered for 70mm projection, making it look better than they did upon their original releases.
Norma Shearer made an agitated phone call to MGM senior executive Paul Rosenfeld, insisting that her reaction shots to Clark Gable's 'Puttin' on the Ritz' (from Idiot's Delight (1939)) be deleted. Unfortunately, it was too late to make any changes, and the shots remained in the film. Shearer explained to Rosenfeld in a letter, "I am presented as no more than an extra without screen credit while others who are dancers and singers perform triumphantly as stars of this production." When Rosenfeld offered to arrange a screening for Shearer, she declined saying, "I would be devastated to see myself as such an insignificant part of the whole. It is a little too late to do anything now except to express to you my wounded pride."
The "Good Morning" number from Singin' in the Rain (1952) was originally inserted in Debbie Reynolds's hosting segment, but was ultimately deleted in favor of Donald O'Connor's "Make 'Em Laugh." "Good Morning" resurfaced two years later in That's Entertainment, Part II (1976).
This was among the last MGM films shot on the studio's renowned back lot, of which there were actually six distinct satellite parcels of land west and south of the main lot (Lot 1). Lot 2, the last of them to serve as a working back lot, was in use until late 1978. Development for residential housing on Lots 3-6 began the year this movie filmed its new material with the studio's stars strolling the various standing sets, which had been allowed to deteriorate for well over a decade before their demolition. This is particularly noticeable in the train station set where Fred Astaire gives his introduction, and Bing Crosby refers to the English Lake area as looking rather "scruffy". On the other hand, the entire purpose of the film is nostalgia, and the use of the 'scruffy' facade, clearly aged and unused, helps to set the tone as one of a brief return to the glamour of the past, even though it was all make-believe.