An adaptation of Gillian Flynn's novel was first reported in development in 2008 by French production company Pathé with Andrea Arnold set to direct, long before the eventual HBO version came to be.

By 2012 the novel had been optioned by Alliance Films with Jason Blum expected to produce, and it was Marti Noxon who then approached Blum with her vision for an eight-episode television series.

Amy Adams joined the project as its lead in February 2016, while the rest of the main cast, including Patricia Clarkson and Eliza Scanlen, wasn't announced until March 2017.

Filming took place across several U.S. locations including Barnesville, Georgia, and multiple California towns such as Los Angeles, Redwood Valley, Santa Clarita, and Mendocino.

There was significant creative turmoil on set, with showrunner Marti Noxon describing 'toe-to-toe screaming matches' between herself and director Jean-Marc Vallée over his tendency to stray from the scripts in favor of visual storytelling.

Noxon, along with Gillian Flynn, Jessica Rhoades, Amy Adams, and another producer reportedly had to pressure Vallée to keep the scripted dialogue in his scenes, which displeased him.

Every episode's title sequence features a different rendition of 'Dance and Angela' by Franz Waxman, originally from the 1951 film A Place in the Sun, including an electronic version by Jeffrey Brodsky used for episode two.

All music in the series is diegetic, meaning it always comes from an in-scene source like a stereo or headphones rather than a traditional score.

The production secured rights to four Led Zeppelin songs, a notoriously difficult band to license, after music supervisor Susan Jacobs explained to them the pivotal, almost escapist role music plays in the protagonist's life.

Sharp Objects is the final directorial work of Jean-Marc Vallée, who died suddenly in 2021.