Pretty Woman originally had a dark ending, reveals Julia Roberts

Julia Roberts has recalled that the original ending of her 1990 romantic hit Pretty Woman was quite dark and hard hitting.

The film is considered a classic, and one of the most memorable projects of Roberts, who portrayed prostitute Vivian Ward opposite Richard Gere's Edward Lewis, a rich corporate raider and playboy from New York.

Roberts, 51, recently appeared in an interview alongside Patricia Arquette, where the latter revealed that she had originally auditioned for the film that was earlier titled 3,000.

"So many, many, many years ago, one of my early auditions was for a movie called 3,000. Most people don't know that 3,000 was the original Pretty Woman script. And the ending was really heavy," Arquette said.

Roberts then revealed the original ending in which her character, Vivian Ward, is shoved out of a car and someone "threw money on top of her, as memory serves, and just drove away, leaving her in some dirty alley."

The actor further said the project never saw the light of the day as a "small movie company" that owned the movie rights "folded over the weekend."

However, Disney soon picked up the script and production. "I thought, 'Went to Disney? Are they going to animate it?' (Director) Garry Marshall came on, and because he's a great human being, he felt it would only be fair to meet me, since I had this job for three days and lost it. They changed the whole thing. And it became more something that is in my wheelhouse," Roberts said.

About 3,000, the actor added, "I couldn't do it then. I couldn't do it now. Thank God it fell apart."