Fox starlet Barbara Lawrence's presence is felt even though her actual screen time is brief. Besides her fleeting cameo appearance, she is referred to at least five other times as the young nemesis to Bette Davis' aging star. She is mentioned as an up-and-coming prospect by an agent, a drunken Davis drives by her house in a mock tour of stars' homes, her image appears in a drugstore ad that confronts Davis, Davis stops to stare at a huge portrait of Lawrence before entering her prospective producer's office, and she spitefully uses Lawrence's vacant dressing room to change alter her make-up before her screen test. For added Hollywood verisimilitude, references are made to other contemporaneous Fox stars including Victor Mature, Debra Paget, Mitzi Gaynor, and Jeanne Crain. Curiously there is a reference to an actor named Ralph Bellows, who's playing the rich, stuffy second lead. This is an obvious reference to the screen persona of Ralph Bellamy, who was not under contract to Fox at the time.
In the scene where a drunken Margaret Elliot takes her Oscar for a ride in her car, Bette Davis used one of her own Oscars.