An unsolicited script from a writer not working on the show - also about Homer and Marge going on a marriage retreat - caused legal problems at the time. To avoid any further problems from this coincidence, the writer was paid $3,000.
Homer's marathon attempt at catching General Sherman, his bludgeoning of the fish and the line "I love you but I have to kill you" are all based on Santiago's fight with the marlin in Ernest Hemingway's "The Old Man and the Sea".
Gloria and John are voiced by Julie Kavner and Dan Castellaneta, making it a rare time where they voiced a couple other than Homer and Marge. Also, Julie's role of Gloria is one of the few times she has voiced a character other than Marge or one of the women of the Bouvier family.
Homer's false memory of the party the following day (in which he imagines himself as being erudite and witty instead of drunk) is a reference to the Algonquin Round Table, a group of New York City writers, critics, actors, and wits.
Material cut from the episode's script included many couples who were supposed to be at the retreat instead of the Flanders family, such as Mr. Burns and his mail-order bride, and Mrs. Krabappel trying to reunite with her estranged husband Ken Krabappel. Reiss said the scene played out "horribly badly", and it appeared as if Mr. Burns's mail-order bride was a prostitute. The Ken Krabappel character was supposed to be based on Dean Martin, but somehow he ended up with a southern accent that made him sound like a hick. The whole scene was rewritten with help from James L. Brooks and it was completed after several hours. A scene in which Moe asked Dr. Hibbert to cure his discolored feces was also removed during the first reading of the script after a complaint by Brooks