"Pontypool" was produced as both a motion picture, and as a radio play. Both versions of "Pontypool" were influenced by Orson Welles' infamous radio production of "The War of the Worlds."
The radio play was broadcast on the BBC's Art & Culture section of their World Service website. It is approximately 58 minutes long, as opposed to the film's running time of 95 minutes.
Bruce McDonald, the director of the film, has said that the victims of the virus are called "conversationalists," as opposed to "zombies".
In describing the stages of the virus, McDonald said:
"There are three stages to this virus. The first stage is you might begin to repeat a word. Something gets stuck. And usually it's words that are terms of endearment, like sweetheart or honey. The second stage is your language becomes scrambled and you can't express yourself properly. The third stage is that you become so distraught at your condition that the only way out of the situation you feel, as an infected person, is to try and chew your way through the mouth of another person".
Tony Burgess, the film's writer and the author of the novel on which the film is based - "Pontypool Changes Everything" - makes a brief cameo in the film as the male singer of Lawrence and the Arabians. His character is credited as "Tony (Lawrence)".
(In fact, at the end of the scene where the singers have performed for the bemused Grant Mazzy, Mazzy himself actually refers to Burgess' character as "Tony Burgess.")
The original conceptualization for the movie was to have Tony Burgess read the script with the wavering line being the only visual. Sydney's voice would be heard and Laurel Ann would only get a mention.
At approximately 36 minutes into the movie, the character of Ken reports on a group of infected taking two people from a van and biting them. The sound of the victims screaming is partially taken from the famous chest bursting scene from the film Alien (1979). You can even hear the distinct hissing sound as John Hurt's character's chest spurts blood for the first time.