The film was produced by United Artists and directed by David Swift, with original staging by Bob Fosse.

The cast includes Robert Morse, Rudy Vallee and Michele Lee all reprising their Broadway roles; as well as Anthony Teague, and Maureen Arthur.

Soon, thanks to the ethically questionable advice in the book, he rises to vice president of advertising by having each person above him either fired or moved or transferred within the company.

Biggley's annoying nephew, Bud Frump (Anthony Teague), also takes advantage of the situation and tries to get to the top before Finch.

The Union Carbide Building (most recently the JPMorgan Chase Tower) that stood at 270 Park Avenue in New York City from 1960 until 2019 was used in exterior shots as the headquarters for the "World-Wide Wicket Company" in the movie.

Bosley Crowther of The New York Times, for example, praised the film as successfully re-creating "just about everything that was conducive to the stage success," especially the performances of Morse and Vallee:Seeing Mr. Morse in close-ups, as those wily expressions cross on his face and those wicked designs of Pal Joey gleam in his Horatio Alger-character eyes, is better (and I'm not chauvinistic) than seeing him on the stage.