Rod Serling personally shared Alan Richards' disbelief in superstition and the supernatural. According to Reverend Ernest Pipes of the Unitarian Universalist Community Church, "Theologically speaking, Rod was what we call a naturalistic humanist, and that was the underlying philosophy of my pulpit."
Uchawi is Swahili for witchcraft or sorcery.
Veteran cinematic and television exotic animal trainer Mel Koontz replaces John Dehner for the fatal lion attack in the closing scene.
The original story by Charles Beaumont was first published in the December 1954 issue of the pulp magazine If: Worlds of Science Fiction.
The opening scene involving Richards and his wife is almost identical to the premise of Fritz Leiber Jr.'s 1943 novel Conjure Wife, filmed as Weird Woman (1944), Conjure Wife (1960), Night of the Eagle (1962) and Witches' Brew (1980).