Selva de Pedra obtained the largest audience in the history of Brazilian television until then, proving the strength of the telenovela as a vehicle of mass culture. In Rio de Janeiro, according to Ibope's record at the time, the plot reached 100% share - number of televisions connected in time - in Chapter 152, in which the identity of Rosana Reis is revealed. Selva de Pedra marked the premiere on TV Globo of director Walter Avancini, ex-TV Tupi. He took over the plot around Chapter 30, when Daniel Son had to move away from production, committed to other roles on the network. By this time, Milton Gonçalves and Reynaldo Boury had also directed the novel.
The story of Selva de Pedra was based on a newspaper article. In a square in the interior of Pernambuco, a young bass player kills a young man who had ridiculed him. From this idea, Janete Clair wrote the plot of the novel, which was also inspired by An American Tragedy, by the American writer Theodore Dreiser. The novel had been brought to the screen in 1931 by Josef von Sternberg with Philips Holmes, Sylvya Sydney and Francis Dee. In 1951, George Stevens also adapted the book and directed The Place in the Sun, with Montgomery Cliff, Elizabeth Taylor and Sheryl Winters. Selva de Pedra consolidated Jante Clair as a great popular author. The main romantic couple of Selva de Pedra made huge success. In November 1972, Francisco Cuoco and Regina Duarte were elected "Reis da Televisão" by readers of Amiga, a magazine specialized in TV coverage. The publication promoted the election in partnership with the Program Silvio Santos, at the time transmitted by Rede Globo.
Francisco Cuoco (Cristiano Vilhena) has stated that he based his character on the young man he grew up with, playing soccer and unsure of the direction they would take in their lives, in Brás, a working-class neighborhood of São Paulo.
Selva de Pedra (1986) is Rede Globo's second production of the story, with 150 episodes and written by Regina Braga and Eloy Araújo, and this time with Tony Ramos and Fernanda Torres as the protagonist couple, Christiane Torloni playing 'Fernanda', and Miguel Falabella as 'Miro'.
This was Kadu Moliterno's (Oswaldo) and Glória Pires's (Glorinha) first telenovela at Rede Globo (he largest commercial TV network in Latin America and the second-largest commercial TV network in the world). Moliterno has said that while doing theater in Rio, he knocked on the author's door and asked for a chance, eventually playing the driver for the character Laura Arlete Salles.