Deleted from the film was the original closing number, "We Must Have Music" (music by Nacio Herb Brown, lyrics by Gus Kahn), featuring Judy Garland, Tony Martin and Six Hits and a Miss. The following year, in a short subject named We Must Have Music, which chronicled MGM musicals from 1929 through 1941, a portion of Judy's song and dance was included.
In a commentary following the film on Turner Classic Movies in 2008, Robert Osborne said that the original script had the Lana Turner character actually die at the end. However, after negative reaction from preview audiences, MGM decided to cut the actual moment of death before the film's official release. As a result, the audience is never certain of the fate of the character, because the film jumps to the Judy Garland finale.
The final shot of the "You Never Looked So Beautiful Before" number is recycled from "A Pretty Girl is Like a Melody" from The Great Ziegfeld. For the sake of continuity, Judy Garland is costumed and made up to resemble Virginia Bruce, who crowned the "Wedding Cake" set in the earlier film.
This was James Stewart's last performance before serving military service in World War II. He would only come back 5 years later in the classic It's a Wonderful Life.
While Judy Garland rerecorded for Decca the wistful standard, "I'm Always Chasing Rainbows" (music by Joseph McCarthy, lyrics by Harry Carroll), the star made no commercial version of the lively rumba written for her by Roger Edens, a ditty turned into a mammoth Busby Berkeley production number, "Minnie From Trinidad." Instead, Decca assigned the song to Jimmy Dorsey and His Orchestra featuring vocalist Helen O'Connell.