Trivia / Licorice Pizza

• Acclaimed Flop: Par the course for Paul Thomas Anderson. Despite near-universal critical acclaim, the film only grossed $31.4 million on a $40 million budget.
• Actor-Inspired Element: The Shabbat scene where Alana's date politely refuses to recite a blessing and reveals that he's an atheist, resulting in an extremely awkward evening, was based on an actual Passover dinner Alana Haim had with her family and told the director about.
• Actor-Shared Background: Alana and her family are Jewish, same as in real life.
• All-Star Cast: Bradley Cooper, Sean Penn, Tom Waits, Maya Rudolph, John C. Reilly, Benny Safdie, Mary Elizabeth Ellis, and even video game/anime voice actors Ray Chase and Allegra Clark. The exceptions are ironically the leads, both of whom had never acted in a film before. Alana Haim is known for being a member of Haim, while Cooper Hoffman is the son of Philip Seymour Hoffman.
• Approval of God: Jon Peters was apparently more than happy with the film's portrayal of him as a coked-up asshole, so long as Anderson included his go-to pickup line: "Do you like peanut butter sandwiches?" Apparently, it works.
• Channel Hop: Focus Features initially acquired the film in 2019, when the project was first announced, but Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer acquired it in July 2020. Universal Pictures still holds international rights.
• Creator-Chosen Casting: Paul Thomas Anderson wrote the screenplay with Alana Haim in mind.
• The Danza: Alana Haim as Alana Kane. Alana's sisters and parents also have the same names as their actors.
• Enforced Method Acting: None of the younger cast members were aware that Bradley Cooper was involved in the film until he came charging at them in full costume as the cameras were rolling. The final take used in the film where Jon Peters introduces himself and asks who is in charge was the first time Cooper Hoffman or Alana Haim saw him.
• Inspiration for the Work: In the early 2000s, Paul Thomas Anderson once walked by a junior high school on picture day and observed a student nagging the female photographer. This gave him the seed that would grow into the relationship between Gary and Alana. In addition, as described under Write What You Know, Gary's character was based on stories told to him by his friend Gary Goetzman.
• No Stunt Double: Whenever Alana is seen driving the truck, it is actually Alana Haim driving the truck, not a double nor a camera trick.
• Production Posse:
  • This is John C. Reilly's fourth film with Paul Thomas Anderson, and the second for Maya Rudolph. And while the film serves as Alana Haim's film debut, it is not her first time working with Anderson, as he's directed several music videos for Haim.
  • On the other side of the camera, composer Jonny Greenwood marks his fifth collaboration with Anderson, while longtime costume designer Mark Bridges also reteaming with the director.
• Real-Life Relative:
  • Paul Thomas Anderson's children appear in different scenes throughout the film. Most prominently, his eldest daughter is the teenage girl sitting next to Gary when he sees that Jack Holden is at the Tail 'O the Cock restaurant.
  • Cooper Hoffman's mother, Mimi O'Donnell appears as one of the reporters interviewing Joel Wachs in his first appearance in the film. His sisters appear as cast members of the performance in New York City on the Jerry Best show.
  • Alana's family is played by Alana Haim's real-life sisters and parents.
• Starring a Star as a Star: Of both the "playing a fictional celebrity" and "playing a real celebrity" varieties. In the former camp, we have Sean Penn as not!William Holden, Christine Ebersole as not!Lucille Ball, and Tom Waits as not!Sam Peckinpah. In the latter camp, we have Bradley Cooper as producer Jon Peters, Benny Safdie as politician Joel Wachs, and John C. Reilly as actor Fred Gwynne (the latter was confirmed in a post-screening panel), In addition, Ray Chase makes an appearance as radio DJ B. Mitchel Reed of KMET (though the radio station Reed is at in this film is made up).
• Urban Legend: The cast listing on the film's Wikipedia page got Ben Stiller and Christopher Walken added without a shred of evidence to back them, leading to the rumor of them being in the film. While Walken was debunked pretty quickly, Stiller took longer to debunk, with PTA himself deconfirming him at a post-screening panel several weeks before the movie's limited release.
• Voice-Only Cameo: Allegra Clark cameos as the police dispatch voice heard when Gary is taken to the police station.
• What Could Have Been: Bradley Cooper was cast after Leonardo DiCaprio reportedly passed on the project to do Nightmare Alley; Cooper would end up replacing DiCaprio in that project as well after DiCaprio departed due to scheduling conflicts with Killers of the Flower Moon. Though DiCaprio's father George has a role in the finished film as the water bed salesman.
• Working Title: The movie was known as Soggy Bottom for a while.
• Write What You Know: In this panel, Paul Thomas Anderson reveals that Gary Valentine was based on his friend Gary Goetzman, a former child actor who started a waterbed company and pinball palace, at one point bringing a waterbed to movie producer Jon Peters (played in the film by Bradley Cooper).

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