An actress initially cast as Bahia Benmahmoud had demanded to remove the nude scene in which she leaves the house without clothes on and wanders down the street and into a train on the Paris Metro, to the surprise of fellow travelers. When Sara Forestier took over the role of Bahia Benmahmoud, she asked for the scene to be put back in, feeling it was a key scene for the character."It was easy because it is so rare to do a nude scene that's funny," she says with a big grin. "If I have the opportunity to do that in my life, I run! I was excited to do it because it was like a burlesque show."
While writing the script, Michel Leclerc and Baya Kasmi didn't have a full story, but rather sixty pages of situations stemming from the idea of a girl who sleeps with her political opponents.
The role of Bahia Benmahmoud was initially written as a typically Arabic Marilyn Monroe type, and as such Michel Leclerc and Baya Kasmi were looking for an actress of North African origins. However they were so struck when they met Sara Forestier that they rewrote the part for her.
Director Michel Leclerc met his co-writer Baya Kasmi in 2000, in a similar way that the two main characters in the film meet.
Michel Leclerc said he was inspired by the films of Woody Allen, particularly Annie Hall (1977) and Radio Days (1987).