Arnold Stang's first feature film.

The "Academy Award Theater" broadcast a 30-minute radio adaptation of the movie on May 18, 1946 with Rosalind Russell and Janet Blair reprising their film roles.

The play, "My Sister Eileen," opened on December 26, 1940 at the Biltmore Theatre. The Broadway production, directed by George S. Kaufman, adapted for the stage from Ruth McKinney's book by Joseph Fields and Jerome Chodorov. The production featured Shirley Booth as Ruth and Jo Ann Sayers as Eileen, with Richard Quine as the soda jerk Frank Lippincott. (He reprises his role in the 1942 film.) The play moved three times, and closed on January 16, 1943, after a run of 864 performances. In 1952, Fields and Chodorovand adapted "My Sister Eileen" into the musical, "Wonderful Town," with music by Leonard Bernstein. The Broadway production of "Wonderful Town" opened at the Winter Garden Theater in New York on February 25, 1953 and ran for 559 performances. In 1955, Columbia Pictures made a separate musical of My Sister Eileen, starring Janet Leigh, Betty Garrett, and Jack Lemmo

The movie is based on the real-life experiences of Ruth McKinney, and her sister Eileen. In 1934, Ruth and Eileen McKinney moved to New York from Columbus, Ohio. They rented a $45-a-month basement apartment at 14 Gay Street in Greenwich Village, above the Christopher Street subway station. Ruth wrote about their eccentric neighbors and the trials of living in a basement apartment in her column titled, "My Sister Eileen," which was published in the "New Yorker" (called "The Manhattaner" in the movie). As seen in the film, "New Yorker" editor Harold Ross was at first reluctant to publish Ruth McKinney's columns, preferring to keep his magazine a "High Society" publication, but he eventually relented. Ruth's columns were gathered in a book, "My Sister Eileen," which was published in 1938. Eileen McKinney moved to Los Angeles, where she married novelist and screenwriter Nathaniel West (author of the perennial Hollywood novel, "The Day of the Locust"). Unfortunately, Eileen McKinney and Nathaniel West were both killed in a car accident in Los Angeles on December 22, 1940, only four days before they were scheduled to attend the Broadway opening of the play, "My Sister Eileen." Ruth McKinney died in 1972 at age 60.

Rosalind Russell reprised her role as Ruth Sherwood in the Broadway musical 'Wonderful Town', which was based on the same novel and play as this movie. For her Broadway role, Russell won the 1953 Tony Award for Best Supporting or Featured Actress in a Musical.