This is one of a few films with a soundtrack that grossed more than the film itself.
The script was only 45 pages long, which explains the many shots of people walking and driving.
Priest's Cadillac Eldorado was owned by K.C., a real-life pimp who appears in the nightclub scene. He got a part in the movie in exchange for use of his car.
Ron O'Neal didn't like the cocaine montage. In an E! True Hollywood Story (1996) interview, he said it so glorified drug use that it was a "commercial for cocaine."
At the film's 40th-anniversary screening, held at the Museum of the Moving Image in Queens, NY, K.C. revealed that his customized Cadillac was eventually seized by the IRS.