Acting for Two: Cheech Marin plays three distinctly different characters; the border cop, the announcer at the bar, and the Mexican mafia dude who shows up at the end.
Quentin Tarantino cast George Clooney as Seth Gecko as a play on his role in ER. He liked the irony of him going from playing a guy who works in the emergency room to a guy who puts people in the emergency room.
Juliette Lewis was cast as Kate Fuller because of her friendship with Tarantino. She previously appeared in Natural Born Killers, whose original screenplay was written by Tarantino (his draft would eventually be heavily revised and he ultimately received a "Story By" credit), and he liked her so much, that he suggested she play Kate.
The role of Santanico Pandemonium was written specifically for Salma Hayek because she did a favor for Tarantino and Robert Rodriguez when they were filming their segment of Four Rooms. The two realized they'd need someone to play a stripper seen on a TV and contacted Hayek the day of shooting. Rodriguez said no nudity was involved and they wouldn't show her face. She agreed and they were so impressed with her performance, they included her in this film. for her in their next project From Dusk Till Dawn (1996). Hayek said she thankfully didn't have to get naked in that one either.
Deleted Scene: A scene was filmed featuring a make-up effect where one of the stripper vampires has her stomach open into a large mouth - before shoving a victim's head into it and getting bitten off. The effect was so graphic that even Tarantino didn't want to see it.
The film has been dubbed into Brazilian Portuguese five times, with two versions being recorded at the same studio (Sigma) almost twenty years apart.
There's also two Japanese dubs: One for home video and another for Netflix.
Enforced Method Acting: Salma Hayek has an intense fear of snakes and spent two months with a therapist to overcome her fear in order to keep her part.
Harpo Does Something Funny: The first scene where the vampires reveal themselves and a massive battle ensues was simply marked in the script as "All Hell breaks loose". Also, Salma Hayek's dance as Satanico Pandemonium had no choreographer. Robert Rodriguez just brought her in and let the music move her as it would.
George Clooney was famous for playing a doctor in ER before being cast in this role as a murdering thief. Almost an example of Playing with Character Type, as Seth does have more of conscience than a lot of criminal characters in films like a lot of Clooney's hero characters, but he has rarely played a character before or since that could be described as immoral.
Tough Brooklyn-born Jew Harvey Keitel is a soft-spoken Southern preacher... and a vampire.
Throw It In!: George Clooney ad-libbed the "no thanks, I already had a wife" line as a joke. When it was put into the trailer, Robert Rodriguez felt obligated to include it in the final cut.
Translation Correction: In the Mexican Spanish dub, Santanico Pandemonium is renamed as "Satanica Pandemonium", as the character is a woman.
The "Ezekiel" speech from Pulp Fiction was originally supposed to be Jacob preparing his stand against the vampires.
Quentin Tarantino was originally set to direct the movie, but decided not to, so that he could focus more on the screenplay and his role as Richard Gecko. Renny Harlin and Tony Scott both expressed interest in directing.
William Sadler was originally cast as F.B.I. Agent Stanley Chase.
The original script had all the protagonists surviving the vampire attack. Richie, Jacob and Scott were killed off in order to make the climax look more exciting.
In addition, Roth and Buscemi were approached to play Pete Bottoms, but neither could fit it into their schedules.
The characters of Sex Machine and Frost were originally written the other way around: Sex Machine was to be the muscular, scarred, leather-wearing biker while Frost was to be a more slender (yet deadly) individual.
In the screenplay, Frost was supposed to face off Razor Charlie with the pool cue and Sex Machine was supposed to hurl vampires onto the legs of a table to kill them. In the finished film, their actions are reversed.
TV series:
Dawson Casting: Averted with 17-year-old Kate, played by 17-year-old Madison Davenport; played somewhat straight with her younger brother Scott, played by 18-year-old Brandon Soo Hoo.
Quietly Cancelled: The third season finished airing in November 2016; partway through the prior month, the cast were released from their contracts, and no official cancellation was ever given otherwise.
Recycled: The Series: Retells and expands the events in the movie with an entirely new cast. A peculiar example in that it premiered 18 years after the movie did.
Romance on the Set: D.J. Cotrona (Seth) met and dated Eiza González (Santanico) onset from 2014-2016. Prior to this he'd dated Adrianne Palicki from 2011 to 2013 - amusingly, she plays his wife Vanessa in the show.
