45 Fun Facts About Pretty Woman

Who directed Pretty Woman?

Garry Marshall directed the 1990 film and gave a restless Richard Gere one note: in this movie one of you moves and one of you doesn't, and Gere was the one who had to stay still.

What was the title of J. F. Lawton's much darker original screenplay for Pretty Woman?

3000 was the sum Vivian is paid for the week in Lawton's bleak first draft; studio executives dropped the title because they thought it sounded like science fiction.

Pretty Woman takes its title from a 1964 hit by which singer?

Roy Orbison began the song when his wife Claudette headed out shopping and co-writer Bill Dees quipped that a pretty woman never needs any money; the film borrowed the title, minus its 'Oh'.

What is the full name of Julia Roberts' character in Pretty Woman?

Julia Roberts plays Vivian Ward, a Hollywood Boulevard sex worker whom Edward Lewis hires as his companion for a week of business engagements.

What is the profession of Edward Lewis, Richard Gere's character in Pretty Woman?

Edward Lewis is a corporate raider who buys struggling companies and sells them off in pieces; he is in Los Angeles to take over Jim Morse's shipbuilding firm.

Which line does Vivian deliver to the Rodeo Drive saleswomen on her return visit?

Returning to the boutique laden with shopping bags, Vivian asks the saleswomen 'You work on commission, right?' and tells them: 'Big mistake. Big. Huge! I have to go shopping now.'

At which hotel does Edward stay in Pretty Woman?

The Regent Beverly Wilshire, at the foot of Rodeo Drive, supplied the exterior, but Edward's penthouse was never there: the suite was a set built on a studio soundstage in Burbank.

What car is Edward struggling to drive when he meets Vivian in Pretty Woman?

A Lotus Esprit got the part after Ferrari and Porsche reportedly refused to have their cars linked with soliciting; Lotus lent a silver Esprit SE, and Vivian ends up taking the wheel.

Who plays hotel manager Barney Thompson?

Héctor Elizondo plays manager Barney Thompson, who drills Vivian on which fork to use before her dinner with the Morses and quietly watches out for her.

Which Seinfeld regular plays Philip Stuckey, Edward's lawyer, in Pretty Woman?

Jason Alexander shot the film just as he was starting out as George Costanza; his Stuckey is the lawyer whose new sports car Edward borrows on the night he meets Vivian.

Who plays Kit De Luca, Vivian's roommate?

Laura San Giacomo, fresh from Sex, Lies, and Videotape (1989), plays Kit De Luca, the streetwise roommate who blows Vivian's rent money on drugs.

Which veteran actor gave his final film performance as shipbuilder Jim Morse in Pretty Woman?

Ralph Bellamy, an Oscar nominee half a century earlier for The Awful Truth, bowed out as the gentlemanly shipbuilder who wins Edward's respect; he died in 1991, the year after the film opened.

Which opera does Edward fly Vivian to see in Pretty Woman?

La Traviata, Verdi's opera about a courtesan who falls for a young man from a respectable family, echoes Vivian's own story, and she is visibly moved by it.

Which sporting event does Edward take Vivian to in Pretty Woman?

A polo match is where Edward's lawyer, who had taken Vivian for a business spy, learns how the two really met and crudely propositions her.

Which Prince song does Vivian sing in the bathtub in Pretty Woman?

Kiss is what Vivian belts out in the bubble bath; kissing on the mouth is the one thing she tells Edward she won't do, a rule she later breaks for him.

Which Pretty Woman moment began as a prank that drew Julia Roberts' unscripted laugh?

Gere snapping the jewellery box shut was a prank the director set up for the gag reel without warning Roberts; her startled laugh played so well that the take stayed in the film.

Which instrument does Richard Gere really play on screen as Edward in Pretty Woman?

Piano: Gere really plays the late-night piece in the empty hotel lounge, and the music is his own composition.

Which band's ballad 'It Must Have Been Love', from the Pretty Woman soundtrack, topped the US Hot 100 in 1990?

Roxette first released the song in Sweden in 1987 as a Christmas single; with the festive reference rewritten for the film, it became a US No. 1 in the summer of 1990.

Which film topped 1990's worldwide box office, two places above Pretty Woman?

Ghost led 1990 with more than $500 million worldwide, ahead of Home Alone and Pretty Woman, so two love stories out-earned every action film of the year.

Which award did Julia Roberts win for playing Vivian in Pretty Woman?

A Golden Globe for best actress in a comedy or musical went to Roberts in 1991; she was Oscar-nominated too, but lost to Kathy Bates for Misery.

Pretty Woman was Disney's highest-grossing R-rated film for 34 years until which 2024 film passed it?

Deadpool & Wolverine continued a series Disney acquired with its 2019 purchase of Fox and kept R-rated; the film passed Pretty Woman's total in its opening week.

How did Lawton's original Pretty Woman script end?

Lawton's original script ended bleakly: Edward dumps Vivian back on the street, and the last image is Vivian and her friend on a bus to Disneyland, staring blankly ahead.

Which actor read with Julia Roberts before turning down the role of Edward in Pretty Woman?

Al Pacino read opposite Roberts but passed; screenwriter J. F. Lawton has said a Pacino version would probably have stayed closer to his dark original script.

Which actress passed on both Shelby in Steel Magnolias and Vivian in Pretty Woman, roles that went to Julia Roberts?

Meg Ryan gave up Shelby in Steel Magnolias to make When Harry Met Sally, then passed on Vivian as well; both parts brought Julia Roberts Oscar nominations.

Which actress nearly played Vivian in Pretty Woman before a scheduling conflict forced her to pass?

Diane Lane has said she had to pass on Vivian because of conflicting schedules; Daryl Hannah also said no, and later called the film degrading to women.

Which film was Julia Roberts known for when cast in Pretty Woman?

Mystic Pizza was Roberts' only released hit, so the studio was wary of an unknown and looked at better-known actresses first; Steel Magnolias had yet to open.

Which 1999 romantic comedy reunited Pretty Woman stars Julia Roberts and Richard Gere?

Runaway Bride brought the pair back with the same director; Roberts plays a woman who keeps leaving fiancés at the altar and Gere the reporter sent to write about her.

Which future Simpsons voice actor appears as a police detective early in Pretty Woman?

Hank Azaria, later the voice of Moe and Chief Wiggum, plays Detective Albertson, questioning bystanders on Hollywood Boulevard after a woman's body is found; it was his first cinema release.

In Pretty Woman, what does Edward order to go with champagne on Vivian's first night in the penthouse?

Strawberries arrive with the champagne because, Edward tells Vivian, the fruit brings out its flavour; she tells him to skip the seduction routine, since she is paid by the hour.

How did the director get Roberts to laugh during the I Love Lucy scene?

Roberts could not laugh naturally at I Love Lucy on cue, so the director did what worked: he tickled her feet off-camera until the giggles were real.

In Pretty Woman, who rescues Vivian in the childhood fantasy she describes to Edward?

As a girl Vivian dreamed a knight on a white horse would climb her tower; Edward replays it by scaling her fire escape from a white limousine, and she 'rescues him right back'.

Which city does Vivian plan to move to at the end of Pretty Woman, to find work and finish school?

San Francisco is where Vivian means to get a job and finish high school, the same city Edward flew her to for the opera; she is packed and waiting when his limousine arrives.

Asked in Pretty Woman to name someone whose fairy tale came true, which character does Kit come up with?

Cinderella, with an expletive in the middle, is the only name Kit can produce when Vivian asks who it ever worked out for, a fitting answer in a film often called a Cinderella story.

Pretty Woman's rags-to-riches makeover echoes which George Bernard Shaw play?

Pygmalion has a professor pass off flower girl Eliza Doolittle as a lady, the makeover plot My Fair Lady set to music; the director said he saw elements of it in the script.

Who wrote the music and lyrics for the 2018 Broadway musical of Pretty Woman?

Bryan Adams and Jim Vallance, the team behind 'Summer of '69', wrote the songs; the film's director co-wrote the book but died in 2016, two years before the Broadway opening.

Which actress from the 2012 Les Misérables film made her Broadway debut as Vivian in Pretty Woman: The Musical?

Samantha Barks, Éponine in the 2012 Les Misérables film, opened as Vivian in August 2018 opposite Andy Karl, who took over as Edward when Steve Kazee left after the Chicago tryout.

Which fear does Edward confess to Vivian on their first night in Pretty Woman?

Heights: Edward won't step onto his own balcony and jokes that he looked for a penthouse on the first floor, yet at the end he climbs Vivian's fire escape anyway.

The studio wanted Vivian's opera gown in Pretty Woman to be which colour before the designer insisted on red?

Black was the studio's choice, but costume designer Marilyn Vance had three gowns made and screen-tested until the director agreed the off-the-shoulder dress had to be red.

Which band has 'Show Me Your Soul' on the Pretty Woman soundtrack?

Red Hot Chili Peppers cut 'Show Me Your Soul' specially for the film while touring their album Mother's Milk, with Billy Preston guesting on keyboards.

Whose body appears beneath Julia Roberts' face on the Pretty Woman poster?

Shelley Michelle supplied the body on the poster and also doubled for Roberts in the opening sequence of Vivian getting dressed, without receiving a screen credit.

Which critic gave Pretty Woman a 'D' in 1990, then wrote 20 years later that he would now grade it a 'B'?

Owen Gleiberman's D ran in Entertainment Weekly in March 1990; twenty years on he called it his most infamous review, stood by some criticisms and still raised the grade to a B.

Which Los Angeles hotel, closed to guests in 1989, supplied some of the hotel interiors in Pretty Woman?

The Ambassador, the Los Angeles landmark that housed the Cocoanut Grove nightclub, closed to guests in 1989 but stayed open as a filming location until its demolition in 2005.

Pretty Woman screenwriter J. F. Lawton also wrote which 1992 Steven Seagal action hit?

Under Siege, with Seagal as a ship's cook retaking a hijacked battleship, came from the same writer two years later; Lawton's script was called Dreadnought until that title tested badly.

What new path is Vivian's roommate Kit looking into at the end of Pretty Woman?

A beauty course is what Kit says she is looking into as she interviews a new roommate, after Vivian hands her money she calls the Edward Lewis scholarship fund.

Disney released the R-rated Pretty Woman under which of its film labels?

Touchstone was the label Disney created in 1984 so it could release films with more grown-up themes away from the family brand; Pretty Woman became the studio's biggest hit to that point.