This was Whitman Mayo's final appearance as Grady Wilson on Sanford and Son
Translating the trick instructions, the Chinese man reads, "I, Howard Hughes, being of sound mind..." This is a reference to the so-called Mormon Will of Howard Hughes discovered in 1976 that named Utah gas station owner Melvin E. Dummar a beneficiary of $156 million from the late tycoon's vast estate. The will was declared a forgery in 1978. Dummar's story and claim to having saved Hughes' life inspired the Jonathan Demme film Melvin and Howard (1980).
The episode title and the episode itself spoof the 1958 Tony Curtis/Sidney Poitier film, The Defiant Ones, in which the two are chain gang escapees shackled together.