The Film Has Connections to It's A Wonderful Life

Believe it or not, there are lots of ties between Christmas Vacation and the 1946 classic It's A Wonderful Life. To begin, Frank Capra III was the assistant director for Christmas Vacation. Coincidentally, he is the grandson of Frank Capra who directed It's A Wonderful Life.

Secondly, the scene where Clark takes a chainsaw to the wobbly newel post is a reference to the broken newel post at the Bailey house in It's A Wonderful Life. Finally, Russ can be seen watching the movie on the couch when his grandparents first arrive.

The Cast of the Movie Was Top-Notch

Christmas Vacation had a pretty impressive cast, especially considering that it was a goofy comedy film. One of its stars, Juliette Lewis, would score an Oscar nomination in a few years.

However, according to Beverly D'Angelo, it was the older cast that was equally if not more impressive. She claimed that "I attribute that to Jeremiah Chechik and his direction in bringing in E.G. Marshall, Doris Roberts, and Diane Ladd [...] That was really a special cast.”