Sally Kellerman was reluctant to take on "another road movie" so soon after Slither (1973). The main thing that persuaded her, she writes, was that she would get to sing, one of Sally's passions. Kellerman also writes that director Dick Richards was uninterested in hearing Sally's thoughts about her character, but had no problem discussing character and motivation with Alan Arkin. Sally says she eventually started filtering her thoughts to Richards through Arkin, as if they were Arkin's ideas.
Barbara Colby, who plays one of the bad drivers in DMV driving school, was murdered before the film was released. She was just 36.
Although it's not listed in the soundtrack, the rock song Rafferty wakes up hungover to in the beginning is Edgar Winter's Frankenstein.
Jack Nicholson was originally announced to play Rafferty, but he got held up shooting Chinatown (1974), and the role went to Alan Arkin.
The Driving Reverend is named Culpepper, and director Dick Richards' previous film was titled The Culpepper Cattle Co. (1972), which featured Charles Martin Smith, who's in this movie.