Michele Lee's movie debut.
All of Rosemary's songs (including "Happy To Keep His Dinner Warm" and "Paris Original") were cut from the movie version. To make up for this "I Believe In You" was given to her for the movie. In the stage play, she does not sing this to him, and the first time we hear it is during the scene where Finch sings it to himself in the executive washroom, but she does a brief reprise of the song after this scene.
How to Succeed in Business Without Really Trying won the Pulitzer Prize in Drama in 1962. Only eight musicals have won the Pulitzer Prize in drama - one per decade from the 1930s to the 1990s. They are as follows: Of Thee I Sing from the 1930s, South Pacific from the 1940s, Fiorello from the 1950s, How to Succeed in Business Without Really Trying from the 1960s, A Chorus Line from the 1970s, Sunday in the Park with George from the 1980s, Rent from the 1990s and Next to Normal from the 2000s.
Many of the actors, notably Robert Morse and Rudy Vallee, reprised their Broadway roles in this film.
The Broadway version of Finch had a lot more "edge" to him. The movie producers felt they had to make him nicer for the movie in order to be more likeable to the audience.
The music during Miss Jones' first entrance is the same music that Nelson Riddle used as the Penguin's Theme in the Batman TV show.
The original Broadway production of "How to Succeed in Business Without Really Trying" opened at the Forty-sixth Street Theater in New York on October 14, 1961, ran for 1417 performances and won the 1962 Tony Awards for the Best Musical and Book and was nominated for Best Score. Robert Morse (Winner of the 1962 Tony Award for Best Actor in a Musical), Rudy Vallee, Ruth Kobart and Sammy Smith recreated their stage roles for the movie version.
The scene featuring Robert Morse skipping & dancing down the street on his way to work (immediately after the "Old Ivy" fight song duet with Rudy Vallee) was filmed on location in New York City using hidden cameras and a small earpiece to cue Morse on his timing. The various amused & astonished passersby were not extras, but rather were New Yorkers reacting genuinely to someone dancing to his own tune.
The song "Coffee Break" was filmed, but the footage was later deemed unusable, leaving a somewhat obvious cut when the coffee cart arrives.