This play achieved higher ratings than any previous Play for Today (1970), leading the BBC to make it into a series.
This play attracted criticism from the press and from Birmingham City Council for its uncompromising portrayal of racist characters.
Rolf Day's racist stand up routine was taken from actual jokes that Philip Martin as part of his research.
Philip Martin had no intention of playing Rawlinson. "There was an actors' strike and Philip Saville, the director, heard me reading some changes and messing around and doing accents and things, and he offered me the part. I'm a trained actor but I hadn't acted for about ten years. So I said "well, I'll do it, but if we start it and you don't think I'm right for it just say, I really don't mind". So when we did the read-through to prove to myself really, I began to act the part. Normally at read-throughs you get mumbles and it's all a laugh there, but because I was acting everybody else thought, oh Christ, he's acting! So everybody had to act. It was a really swinging film reading. Barry had never had a meeting like that before. That's how we launched into making the film".
Philip Martin had never been to Birmingham prior to writing the script. He was sent there for three months to research the city's criminal underworld. He was told that if his efforts proved fruitless, he'd at least have had a three week holiday.