Julia Roberts’ Character Was Originally Supposed to Die in ‘Pretty Woman’

Well, that would have been the WORST ending to Pretty Woman!

Walt Disney Studios chairman, Jeffrey Katzenberg, recently revealed Julia Roberts' character, Vivian Ward, was originally supposed to die at the end of the 1990 film from a drug overdose.

Julia as Vivian Ward in Pretty Woman.

"I can't tell you how much time was spent debating," Katzenberg said at a Q&A session on Thursday, March 2 at Hearst Tower in NYC, according to Page Six. "As a script, Pretty Woman was an R-rated movie about a hooker on Hollywood Boulevard. By the way, in the original version — it's pretty dark — I think she died of an overdose."

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However, Disney wasn't in favor of the gruesome ending — and we're secretly so thankful. "Convincing [people] that we should make that at the Walt Disney Co., and that it's a fairy tale and a princess movie, a lot of people had a hard time seeing it," he added. "But, as they say, the rest is history."

Julia and Richard as Vivian Ward and Edward Lewis, respectively, in Pretty Woman.

In the ever-so-popular Rom-Com, Julia portrayed a hooker who gets hired by a wealthy businessman named Edward Lewis (played by Richard Gere) to be his date to social functions. The two end up falling in love, and the fairytale ending of the film resulted in the movie becoming the highest number of US ticket sales ever of its kind, as well as one of the highest grossing films of 1990.

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In a previous interview, the blockbuster's screenwriter, J.F. Lawton, gave readers insight on the Garry Marshall-directed movie. "I think it got produced because the original script had gone to Sundance, it was prestigious, it was viewed as serious art, so it was allowed to touch into this area of sexuality and money and prostitution and all of that," he confessed to Vanity Fair. "It gave Hollywood permission to do it, and then Garry was smart enough, because he's got incredible pop instincts, to say, 'OK, this is what people want to see, they want to see the fairy tale.'"

Click through the gallery below to see the cast of Pretty Woman then and now!