Trivia

Michael Berryman and Nicholas Worth, both employees of the film's villainous location of Steaming Springs, worked with director Wes Craven before. Berryman became iconic in Craven's The Hills Have Eyes (1977) (and later, the sequel The Hills Have Eyes Part II (1984)) and Worth played a henchman transformed into a monster in Swamp Thing (1982). Billy Beck, who played a mover, also appeared in Craven's Summer of Fear (1978) as the sheriff.

The set for the residential interior was constructed on a sound stage in/at the Culver City Studios on Washington Boulevard (the old Selznick Studio of Gone with the Wind (1939) fame), where production offices were also located. The interior living room stage set required a turnaround for the scenario effects script requirement (with wind and bricks flying from and through the walls). On the same sound stage, the health club set was erected with three thicknesses of plaster wall board covering the wooden stage flooring set footprint, required for the controlled fire effects when Jessica Jones (Susan Lucci) introduces her "hellish" character's charms. The translucent vacuum formed panels, used in the set wall panels, started melting from the intense heat radiated from the gas-line pipes which were positioned to create the aisle of fire Lucci walked through. The fire sequence required several retakes causing the plastic material melting. Viewing the sequence, you can see the vacuum formed 4" deep pyramid pattern-plastic design sag on camera. Lucci's costume and hair were singed and scorched from the intense heat.

The NASA astronaut space suit costume that Robert Urich was to wear at the climax of the "inferno Hell" sequence became a major problem initiated with the film's production scheduling. Hub Braden took the task of getting an astronaut space suit wardrobe package since a film costumer was not hired. He contacted costume designer Patricia Norris at MGM Studios in Culver City as Norris had been involved in 2010: The Year We Make Contact (1984). MGM Wardrobe had the only collection of 'NASA astronaut space suits' in Hollywood. The space suit costume, however, was not complete; the shoulder/backpack assembly package was missing and had to be designed and constructed. It also needed a battery-operated motorized cooling fan unit to keep the actor from overheating while wearing the suit. The effects house filmed a sequence of Urich wearing his NASA space suit protecting him from the intense heat, descending into Hell's inferno. This sequence was scheduled as a miniature shot, but the effects house did not have the capacity to provide the miniature space suit doll. Braden purchased an eight-inch military GI Joe plastic toy doll and fabric material matching the space suit's material finish. He gave the toy doll to his mother who made patterns and sewed together the miniature space suit to fit the GI Joe doll. Braden carved the backpack, gloves, and boots from balsa wood matching the space suit's backpack unit built by construction coordinator Jerry Esposito Jr.. A small white plastic ball was detailed to match the space suit helmet. The Hollywood Effects filming team mounted the miniature doll to a steel rod attached to the doll's belly button. The doll was spun in blue screen process, with the camera tracked (backing) away from the spinning miniature space-suit-doll; this sequence was matted over another filmed background plate providing the illusion of Matt Winslow in his space suit sailing down into Jessica Jones's subterranean inferno environment.

ABC-TV Daytime-series 1983 contract with actress Susan Lucci for her featured "Erica Kane" role on All My Children (1970), guaranteed her a 'first' - a nighttime Movie of the Week (MOW) for her extension as Erica Kane on the soap-opera series. The network's nighttime MOW programming division optioned Richard Rothstein to write a science fiction-horror-thriller specifically for Lucci for ABC's 1983-1984 MOW nighttime season of specials. This project was planned to give Lucci a dramatic opportunity in hopes she would be nominated in the nighttime Emmy Best Actress category. The producing team of Robert M. Sertner (producer), Frank von Zerneck (executive producer), and Phillips Wylly Sr. (executive in charge of production/production manager) was entrusted to develop it. When production was initiated at Culver City Studios (aka The David Selznick Studio), Petko D. Kadiev, an accomplished storyboard illustrator, was brought on board to illustrate and storyboard the script. Production designer/art director Hub Braden was hired to preliminarily budget, scout, and design the sets. Jerry Esposito Jr. (construction supervisor and coordinator), and Anthony J. Saenz (location manager) also joined the production creative film team. As no director had yet been selected, the ABC nighttime network programming suits and the producers negotiated to hire Wes Craven to fill the role. ABC wanted Craven because of his unique previous television and feature film writing and directing accomplishments. By the time he joined the project, much of the developing was completed, so Craven set about studying the script, viewing story-board script illustrations, and collaborating with the creative team on a few of the conceptual requirements. Casting had already settled on Lucci, featured as the female "Lucifer" Jessica Jones, Robert Urich as Matt Winslow, Joanna Cassidy as Urich's character's wife Patricia "Pat" Winslow, and Kevin McCarthy as Mr. Thompson. Dean Cundey was hired as cinematographer, and Craven and the producers conducted casting meetings to select the final cast members. While discussing the script motivation during scouting locations, Braden suggested to Craven and Sertner to embellish the film's ending by adding a "Hitchcock twist", setting up a potential sequel for Lucci. Sertner turned to Craven exclaiming, "Why didn't we think of that!" The dynamic team, however, feared the network suits response to an added twist, an alteration of the network's approved script. The only Academy of Television Arts and Sciences Creative Arts Emmy nomination for the film was in the category of Art Direction.

A preliminary production asset of "storyboarding" a script by a visual layout graphic illustrator is rare in a television movie or a series program - a luxury few producers budget or schedule. Due to ABC's focus developing this Movie of the Week property for Susan Lucci, producers Robert M. Sertner and Frank von Zerneck immediately hired Russian film script illustrator Petko D. Kadiev; illustrating the script gave the producers a visual presentation storybook to dazzle the network suits and an analysis of camera shots providing a visual, tangible bible for both the director and the cinematographer. These film-shot layouts provided the optical effects team a complete analysis of its work to be performed. The Hollywood Effects house previously had provided the film-optical effects for all of the British produced James Bond films in its London based unit. The American-owned effects company had established its Hollywood based facility in the heart of Hollywood, located in a huge stage facility near the Samuel Goldwyn Studio, located off Santa Monica Boulevard. Kadiev's storyboard script sequence was handed over to the optical effects team, which determined the shot sequence required by the script's dictated shot setups. Robert Urich performed all of the space suit work during filming; he was not doubled by another actor or a stunt double. Staff-plastic-skin hard-wall flats, built on the Culver City production stage, were transferred to the Hollywood Effects stage for additional filming, utilizing both first and second effect team photography units. The "Jessica Jones' hell inferno" two-day optical effects filming sequence was the final filming of the project.