Broadcast on M6, Garry Marshall’s romantic comedy released in 1990 should have had a much more tragic ending than the one we know today.
It’s a classic romantic comedy that can be rewatched this Monday evening. M6 broadcasts Pretty Woman, with Richard Gere and Julia Roberts, this February 5, 2024 at 9:10 p.m. Viewers will be able to dive back into the romance between Edward, a rich, disillusioned businessman, who will regain a taste for life through contact with Vivian, a prostitute paid by the latter to play his girlfriend.
Served by the original soundtrack and especially Roy Orbison’s song brought up to date during a shopping sequence that has become essential, this feature film also allowed Julia Roberts to become an essential Hollywood star, while the role was initially proposed to Meg Ryan or Molly Ringwald.
The ending had to be darker
Like any self-respecting romantic comedy, Pretty Woman ends with an expected happy ending that has become cult for generations of spectators. And yet, this was not originally supposed to be the case. The film was also called 3000 originally, in reference to the amount of money Edward paid for Vivian’s services. Before filming, the script underwent numerous changes.
According to the initial scenario, the conclusion of the film directed by Gary Marshall was to take a much darker turn: Edward and Vivian did not end up together. As Julia Roberts recalled in an interview Actors on Actors made by Variety: “He threw her [Vivian] from the car, threw the money in her face, if memory serves, and he drove off, leaving her in a dark alley.” She also doesn’t specify whether the “he” in question refers to the character of Richard Gere or to another.
In the Netflix documentary The Movies that made us, we learn that Vivian finds herself with the 3000 dollars promised by Edward, alone, and that she decides to take her friend Kit to Disney. Indeed, the screenwriter of the film explained in 2015 in the columns of Variety that the feature film was originally intended to be a critical commentary on the wealth gap in the United States, and in particular
Julia Roberts and Richard Gere may have saved the film
And if the more classic conclusion of the happy ending was favored, it is partly thanks to the arrival of Garry Marshall as director, and especially to the performance of Richard Gere and Julia Roberts: “The alchemy between them was palpable on screen and during the auditions, recalls JF Lawton, the screenwriter, to Vanity Fair. We couldn’t imagine it could end any other way, they lit up in each other’s presence.”
And it is undoubtedly thanks to this that Pretty Woman has also become cult, more than 30 years after its first cinema release. Please note that if you cannot see the film when it is broadcast on M6 this Monday February 5, it is also accessible in streaming on the Disney+ and Netflix subscription platforms.