Rick van Gastel was almost killed in the scene where Abeltje's mother lands the seaplane near the scaffolding he stands on. The plane crashed into the scaffolding, and Van Gastel only escaped by jumping out of the way. The footage of the incident is included in the film.
Rick van Gastel said in an interview with Linda Nieuws that seven weeks of location shooting took place in Spain, nearly two weeks in Luxembourg, and five days in New York. Luxembourg stood in for New York in a number of scenes, for budgetary reasons.
Based on the book 'Abeltje' by Annie M.G. Schmidt.
The film was released on May 19, 1999 on DVD and VHS by Warner Home Video.