De mendigo a millonario

This was Ralph Bellamy's ninety-ninth film, and Don Ameche's forty-ninth. This was Eddie Murphy's second film, and he joked: "Between the three of us, we've made one hundred fifty movies!"

The train leaving Washington, D.C. has a different style locomotive than the same train shown later in a pass-by shot.

Jon Tenney is credited as "Big Black Guy" and James D. Turner as "Even Bigger Black Guy".

A scene that is available only in the television version is where Valentine first enters the Duke and Duke building. The cut version shows Coleman dropping off Valentine for his first day of work, then shows a smiling Valentine exiting an elevator and speaking to a receptionist. The uncut scene (television version) has Valentine entering the main hall of the building and going through a series of interactions with the same people that was nearly identical to the scene near the beginning when Winthorpe enters the building to go to work. This scene is one of the many ways of portraying contrasts in the movie; in this case "not knowing what to expect rookie" versus "veteran snob". This scene also shows why Valentine has a smile on his face as he exits the elevator and speaks confidently to the receptionist. Valentine surely was nervous before he entered the building talking to Coleman, but he gains confidence as he progresses down the main hall toward the elevator.

Featured in At the Movies: The Man with Two Brains/Superman III/Trading Places/Psycho II (1983)