Star Dudley Moore was immediately smitten with Like Father Like Son (1987). Moore said: "The idea of swapping bodies appealed to me, and it was a good excuse to be a kid again . . . although I don't need an excuse. It was just a fun story. I had been sixteen years old once, and I don't pretend to be a professional adult. I really didn't play a sixteen year old. I think that would have been mildly boring. So, instead of going for accuracy, we went for the fun of the situation. I was playing an attitude, not an age".
This was Dudley Moore's highest grossing starring vehicle after his back-to-back star making hits 10 (1979) and Arthur (1981).
Part of a late 1980s mini-cycle of age-swap / body-swap pictures. The movies included Like Father Like Son (1987), Big (1988), 18 Again! (1988), Vice Versa (1988), and Dream a Little Dream (1989).
Director Rod Daniel and producers David Valdes and Brian Grazer pointed to the benefits of teamwork in accomplishing the feat of turning around the production of a movie from conception to release within a year. In fact, Like Father Like Son (1987) started as a movie high concept late 1986 and wrapped principal photography on 20th May 1987 with some additional photography required for filming some additional scenes in late June 1987. The picture premiered on 2nd October 1987 less than a year before it was discussed for the first time in studio meetings during November 1986.
The film's two stars, Dudley Moore and Kirk Cameron, commented on the physical aspects of making the movie. The parts were could be very physical, which, at one point, took its toll on Cameron, who spent his every free moment at the gym. Cameron said: "We spent three days on this track scene, and I was home for two days after we did that, just sitting because I couldn't walk. My legs were so tight". Moore, a master of physical comedy, never takes a role for that aspect. In fact, he tends to take the physical comedy for granted. Moore said: "It's the little unseen things that are real physical for me."