Director Menahem Golan has said that when the picture was booed midway through at the 1980 Montreal Film Festival, he left the theater, went to his hotel and was preparing to commit suicide by jumping off the balcony when his business partner barged in and stopped him.
Reportedly, during its premiere at the Paramount Theater in Hollywood, audiences threw their free souvenir soundtracks at the screen, causing extensive damage.
Screenwriters Kobi Recht and Iris Recht set their screenplay in 1984 because of the Orwellian themes in the story. Director Menahem Golan decided the year was too close to the era in which they were living, so he pushed back the setting to 1994.
Choreographer Nigel Lythgoe later became head judge and producer of So You Think You Can Dance (2005), and both he and assistant choreographer Ken Warwick produced American Idol (2002).
Catherine Mary Stewart learned the music and was working with a vocal coach who was confident she could perform the songs. However, the producers got cold feet, hired professional singer Mary Hylan to record the songs, and made Stewart lip-sync to Hylan's recordings. Decades later Stewart commented, "She was wonderful and I'm thrilled that I had her voice attached to my face, so it's all good in the end." Stewart later had the opportunity to do her own singing in Scenes from the Goldmine (1987).