Future husband James Cameron suggested to Bigelow that she use the ready-made ensemble cast from his recent hit Aliens (1986), and thus Lance Henriksen, Bill Paxton, and Jenette Goldstein all appear in Bigelow's film. Michael Biehn had also appeared in Aliens and was considered, but declined to participate.
According to Bill Paxton, the driver that gives him the finger when he's hitchhiking is played by none other than James Cameron, who had visited the set that day.
Unusual for a vampire movie, the word "vampire" is never mentioned.
According to Lance Henriksen, he prepared for his role of Jesse by coming up with a background for his character and acting it out. The origin story he came up with was that Jesse was in the Confederate navy when he became a vampire. Henriksen painted his hair black with tar, since that was an actual thing seamen did in the 1800's. He then added broken fake nails to make his fingers look like the extensions of his finger bones and went to town at night like that while in character. He managed to scare a waitress in Denny's and a hitchhiker twice his size he picked up on the road one night. The hitchhiker quickly asked to leave the car as soon as they drove up to the first inhabited area, so Henriksen, without revealing that he was just an actor messing with the guy, gave the man all 80 dollars he had on him for being a good sport. Henriksen always jokingly adds that he was lucky, since the hitchhiker could have easily overpowered him in a fight and "make him cry like a baby."
During filming, the cast and crew had to deal with a train that would stop at the same intersection every night. One night, Bill Paxton (in full make-up with half of his face missing) saw one of the train workers leave the diesel engine, and went up to him saying, "Hey, man, there's been an accident... and if you think I'm bad, wait 'til you see the other guy!"