This film is based on real life and several of the people the characters are based upon appear in the movie as extras. At the car flip-over party, the runaway girl sits on the lap of the real Sam, Michael Hutchence's character. The real Tim, filmmaker Richard Lowenstein, is seen in a blue and white striped shirt and wearing a head scarf at the same party. The real little guy in the trench coat appears outside the restroom where the movie little guy in a trench coat is shooting up. Chuck plays himself; that is the real Chuck Meo on screen. The real Sam can also be seen at the club, watching the woman doing the Nick Cave cover.
After her fight with Sam, Anna goes to her mother's house and watches My Man Godfrey (1936) on television with her.
The film takes place in 1978.