Hitchcock considered such actors as Burt Reynolds and Roy Scheider (for Adamson), Al Pacino (for George), Faye Dunaway (for Fran), and Beverly Sills and Goldie Hawn (for Blanche) for the film.
Hitchcock had earlier worked with Bruce Dern on episodes of Alfred Hitchcock Presents and on Marnie (1964), in which he had a brief role in a flashback playing a doomed sailor.