Blooper

During "Run and Tell That", when the students get onto the bus, its number is 17. When the students are inside the bus, its number is 26.

At the beginning of "Run and Tell That", Penny's pigtails have little to no curl. On the bus, they become more curled, and during "Big, Blonde, and Beautiful", they are perfectly curled.

All during the movie, the blond portions of Tracy's hair change. The blond streaks below her headband don't appear until her first appearance on the Corny Collins show. Especially during "Welcome to the Sixties", the blond streaks above Tracy's headband constantly change, even during the same scene as the camera shots are from different directions or they change locations, such as from room to room in the home and from inside to outside.

during Stop the Beat number when Amber is in the Throne up in the air and tries to get down she slips and her dress seemingly tears but after she falls the dress seems perfectly fine.

During the "You Can't Stop the Beat" number, keep an eye on the large board with the bar charts illustrating how many viewers voted for each Miss Hairspray. The bar charts are not consistent between close up and long shots. Close up shots show Amber almost winning, Tracy close on her heels. Long shots during dance numbers show Tracy trailing by quite a bit.

In the movie opening scenes, the newspaper shown is dated May 3, 1962. However, the headlines refer to events that occurred in September of 1962 (Sonny Liston-Floyd Patterson fight and also Governor Ross Barnett defying Supreme Court's ruling to allow Negroes to attend Mississippi University).

When Tracy and Penny rush into the Turnblad house to catch the beginning of the Corny Collins Show, the B&W TV set picture came on instantly which would never be possible since those cathode ray tubes needed quite a warm up period before they showed the picture.

During the opening "Good Morning Baltimore" song segment, a school bus labeled "Patterson School District" passes behind Tracy on the streets of Baltimore. Although she attends Patterson Park High School, it's still the Baltimore School District.

A majority of the masks, specifically the clown masks in the window of Wilbur's shop, were manufactured after 1962 when the movie is based. The clown masks in the window were produced in 1988 by the now defunct Cèsar company.

In almost every scene in the Corny Collins studio, the red "tally" lights for every camera are active at the same time. A "tally" light indicates to the talent and operator which camera is live, thus having them all on at once would defeat the purpose. During "The Nicest Kids In Town" when the film transitions from the television in the Turnblad's home to the viewfinder on the camera, that camera's tally lamps are all off.

When Penny is taking Tracy's parents to the TV to see Tracy on the Corny Collins Show, Edna says "You think I wanna think he's really up there?" While some might believe she is referring to the moon landing, which occurred in July 1969 (7 years after the movie takes place), Edna is in fact referring to Major John Glenn orbiting the Earth, which occurred in February 1962, just before the movie is set.

When Edna discovers Tracy at Motormouth Maybelle's record store party, the prosthetic makeup around John Travolta's mouth can be seen cracking and separating when his lips purse.

Though specifically set in May and June of 1962, many of the trees seen in exterior shots have browning leaves, as the film was shot in the fall of 2006, several months before being released.

In Geography class after the "Good Morning Baltimore" when the teacher is writing the height of Mt. Everest on the board you can plainly see that it has been written then erased, probably because a retake of the scene.

In the first "Nicest Kids In Town" number Amber Von Tussle is wearing a stripped pink dress and has her hair done like a bee hive. In the second "Nicest Kids In Town" number you can see a small clip from behind of her wearing the same thing. The first clip was used a second time.

At several points in the film self-inflating whoopee cushions are depicted, but cushions of the self-inflating variety were not available until the 1990s.

When Tracy hitches a ride to school atop a garbage truck, the vehicle is an International Harvester Cargostar model not manufactured until the late 1970's.

In the "Miss Teenage Hairspray" scenes within the TV studio, the opening of the show uses moving lights which weren't introduced until the late 80s, despite the attention to detail using lighting fixtures appropriate to the period in the TV studio

In "Welcome to the 60s", Edna and Mr Pinky are negotiating Tracy's contract. Edna asks Mr Pinky to 'throw in a bustier'. The word 'bustier' did not enter the English language until the 1970s, some ten years after the film is set. Incidentally, the outfit that Edna is later seen in is not a bustier.

During the first musical number 'Good Morning Baltimore', Tracy runs across the street from an Esso to look at her reflection in a store window. In this window passed Tracy's reflection a modern plastic water cooler can be seen in the store. The water cooler has a red and blue button with a blue light in the indent for the water spout.

In the opening number "Good Morning Baltimore", when Tracy is singing down the street, TTC (Toronto Transit Commission) streetcars are clearly visible at least twice.

During the opening credits, a 1957 Ford Meteor is seen parked at curbside. The Meteor was a model manufactured and sold exclusively in Canada. It is unlikely that one would have been in Baltimore in 1962.

In "Timeless To Me," who lit the candle? Edna and Tracy were at Mr. Pinky's shop. When they came back and Tracy went to bed, Edna changed then sang "Big Blond and Beautiful." Edna was then crying on the bed.

At the beginning when Tracy Turnblad wakes up out of bed during the opening musical number "Good Morning Baltimore" her hair starts out being messy, and as she dresses up and gets ready for school, she styles her hair into her signature bouffant. This hair styling process takes time to do as she would not have had enough time to do it for the time being, and requires use of a round hairbrush or hair rollers to do.

During the history class scene right before "Run and Tell That" the teacher writes on the board about the First Continental Congress in Philadelphia. He writes September 1st, but the correct date is September 5th, 1775, when it first convened.

During "You Can't Stop the Beat", while Edna is dancing and singing, they pan over to Link, who is also singing. The words he sings do not match the words that Edna sings.

During the start "Welcome to the 60's", Edna is wearing a blue, brown and purple plaid dress. Later in the film, Tracy calls her in a scene following "Without Love", and Edna is wearing the same dress. This is impossible as on that same night, Edna has been shown wearing a purple top and purple skirt, and later her purple road. It is likely both scenes of Edna answering the phone where shot in the same time period.

Tracy was able to leave detention as soon as the bell rings. In reality, students aren't able to leave the classroom even after the bell rings until the teacher dismisses them.

When Edna tries to wake up Tracy after reconciling with Wilbur and finds out Tracy is gone and she runs out of Tracy's room to warn Wilbur. She is seen running straight into the hallway but seems like she tripped over something which made her run into the door.