Hugh Laurie auditioned for the role as Dr. Gregory House in his hotel room bathroom in Namibia. He was rehearsing his role for the film The Flight of the Phoenix and claimed that the bathroom was the only place with enough light. He also apologized for his appearance on tape before the audition as he'd just come back from filming. The fact that House has a somewhat scruffy and unkempt look, particularly his constant five o'clock shadow, has been attributed by creator David Shore to Laurie's appearance in this audition tape.

Bryan Singer was looking for an American actor to play House and when he saw Hugh Laurie's audition tape said that he had found his American actor. Hugh Laurie is in fact British.

During a guest appearance on The Tonight Show on 16 November 2005, Laurie revealed that he took the highly-addictive painkiller Vicodin in order to get into character for his role as Dr. House.

The character of House is based on Sherlock Holmes. Both suffered drug addictions (House - pain killers, Holmes - cocaine). Both focus on the patient/criminal's motives and actions rather than physical evidence. Neither can cope with normal society and have sociable sidekicks (Wilson and Watson - Dr. Wilson actually gets called Dr. Watson once by a patient in the first series). Both are extremely lazy when not on a case (Holmes read the agony aunt columns in the paper, House watches Soaps). Both never call anybody by their first names and finally both live at No 221B.

Jesse Spencer, who plays Dr. Chase, grew up in a family of Doctors. His father and two brothers are doctors while his sister is going through med school. When they see one of the episodes they not only try to figure out the cause before him but note all his medical mispronunciations.

In this episode the director, Bryan Singer, makes a cameo as the director of the sports documentary Hank Wiggen is starring in.

Victoria's drawing of "Kaplow's Pawn Shop" is an in-joke reference to writer and producer Lawrence Kaplow.

The $100 bill that House tries to bribe the cop with is fake. The portrait of Ben Franklin is facing the wrong way.

Mrs. Miller mentions that she can't stop thinking about Ashton Kutcher. Coincidentally, John Patrick Amedori, who plays Matt Davis in this episode, also played a young Ashton Kutcher in the 2004 movie, The Butterfly Effect.

On the TV after House finishes watching his soap, its credits are rolling. Most are made-up names but two are in-joke references to staff members. Marcy Kaplan as Hair Stylist - usually credited as Marcy G. Kaplan, she was an Associate Producer for that episode and is now a Co-Producer. And Cindy Carr as Wardrobe - she was a Set Decorator for the entire first season except for the Pilot.

The programs on House's TiVo include "the OC" and "Spongebob". He also has a few episodes of "Blackadder", a show which featured Hugh Laurie.

Elvis Costello recorded the song "Beautiful" especially for this episode. Mentioned by David Shore on the DVD.