The club scenes where Randy takes Julie were filmed in a Sunset Strip club originally named Filthy McNasty's in the 1960s and '70s. In the '80s it was called 'The Central,' which was later purchased by Johnny Depp and is now known as The Viper Room, where River Phoenix infamously died on Halloween, 1993.
Nicolas Cage had a crush on co-star Deborah Foreman. He later admitted in an interview," I just adored Deborah, so there was very little acting on my part." Cage would write her poetry on set, and one poem was titled, "American Girl," which Foreman still has to this day.
In the "making of" documentary on the 20th anniversary DVD, Elizabeth Daily admitted that she had no idea how to talk like a Valley Girl. To cover this up, she decided that her character, Loryn, would not be from the Valley, but from nearby Malibu instead.
The producers of this film approached Frank Zappa about making a film based on his hit single "Valley Girl" (released May 1982), but he refused, leading the producers to make the film without his involvement. Zappa later sued them but lost the case.