During filming, David Morse (Mr. Turner) did not speak to Shia LaBeouf (Kale) or any of the other teens. LaBeouf said, "When we finished filming, he was very friendly. But he's a method actor, and as long as we were shooting, he wouldn't say a word to us."
The copyright holders of Cornell Woolrich's short story 'It Had to Be Murder', which Rear Window (1954) was based on, sued DreamWorks, Paramount Pictures, and Steven Spielberg for using the story without permission. In 2010, a federal judge dismissed the suit, ruling "The main plots are similar only at a high, unprotectable level of generality ... Where 'Disturbia' is rife with sub-plots, the short story has none. The setting and mood of the short story are static and tense, whereas the setting and mood of 'Disturbia' are more dynamic and peppered with humor and teen romance.". The publishers have a point though, this is, in some ways, an updated version of Rear Window, a film ironically originally released by Paramount, but now owned by Universal.
(at around 15 mins) To prepare for his role, Shia LaBeouf spoke with many former house arrest detainees, which is where the idea for the Twinkie Tower came from.
Contrary to prior reports, Kale's house is not the same house as seen in Zathura: A Space Adventure (2005).
Disturbia was filmed on location in the cities of Whittier, California and Pasadena, California. The homes of Kale and Mr. Turner, which were supposed to be next door to each other, were actually located in two different cities.