Trivia / Return of the Secaucus Seven

• Actor-Shared Background: Like his character, Gordon Clapp was not that good at playing charades or basketball. On the other hand, Mark Arnott was talented at chopping wood.
• The Cast Showoff: Adam LeFevre wrote and played all the songs he performs in the movie.
• Creator Backlash: John Sayles admitted he would have liked to have used more hand-held camerawork to make the movie look more raw, as he felt it looked too slick.
• Irony as She Is Cast: John Sayles, who has never been married (though he lives together with Maggie Renzi, who has acted in and produced many of his movies) and has never had kids, plays the one male in the movie who is married and has kids.
• Keep Circulating the Tapes: The VHS version of the movie had a scene of the characters visiting Lacey in her dressing room after the play (see Stylistic Suck on the main page), but that scene is not included on the DVD.
• No Budget: Sayles made the film on $60,000^note around $239,000 in 2023, filming entirely on location in New Hampshire with actors he had worked with in theater, and the cast did their own costumes and makeup. In addition to writing, directing, and editing the film, Sayles also performed other duties, as did Maggie Renzi (Sayles' life-partner), who appears in the film as Katie. Though the movie was initially a flop when it opened in New York, it did good business around other big cities (and did well in New York when it re-opened there), eventually making $2 million at the box office. It also received mostly good reviews, especially from Siskel & Ebert.
• One-Book Author: Maggie Cousineau and Bruce MacDonald never appeared in another movie after this one.
• Production Posse: Gordon Clapp (Chip), David Strathairn (Ron) and Nancy Mette (Lee, the rock critic Jeff and J.T. meet in a bar) have all appeared in several of Sayles' films, including Matewan, which all of them appeared in.
• Throw It In!: Originally, in the script, when Ron and Jeff first see each other, and Ron asks if Jeff's still with Maura, Jeff was supposed to answer, "That's what I've come here to find out." Mark Arnott, who plays Jeff, convinced Sayles it would be better for the film and the character if Jeff lied and said they were still together. Sayles agreed, and it ended up in the film.
• Write What You Know: Sayles based all of the characters on people he had met in college and in the theater group he worked with.