Picard's crumbling emotions, mirroring Sarek's inner turmoil, echoes a similar scene of Spock in The Naked Time (1966), even down to a single take being used.
Director Les Landau filmed Picard's outburst while moving the camera around him starting from his left and finishing on his right. Because the shot was filmed several times in a single take, Patrick Stewart had to do the heavily emotional scene several times in its entirety as well.
The script originally involved another ambassador, but the writers decided to use Sarek to "bring home the idea that even the greatest of men is subject to mental illness."
First time a Vulcan mind meld was done in "Star Trek: The Next Generation".
Sarek introduces Perrin to Captain Picard and Commander Riker as "she who is my wife". In Journey to Babel (1967), he introduced his first wife, and Spock's mother, Amanda to Captain Kirk and Dr. McCoy exactly the same way. The exchange "We come to serve" and "You service honors us" is also from said episode."