Sir Michael Palin says that the plot was taken from a real-life incident involving his great-grandfather.
Final theatrical movie of Robert Eddison ("Rushden" --- The President), who passed away the same year.
The character of Miss Caroline Hartley was originally a much older woman and the role was offered to Anne Bancroft, who turned it down. Ellen Burstyn was then offered the part before the character was completely re-written.
Michael Palin's script was inspired by a diary note of his great-grandfather, Edward Palin, who in 1866 resigned from St. John's College, Oxford, to marry an Irish-American girl he had met with her guardian on a walking tour in the Alps five years earlier.