Julia Roberts has reflected on the legacy of Pretty Woman and admitted she wouldn’t star in the movie if it were made today.
Pretty Woman, a romantic-comedy movie released in 1990, features Roberts as the prostitute Vivian, who bonds with Richard Gere’s Edward Lewis, an emotionally distant corporate raider who transforms her life in an unlikely romantic tale.
When speaking to Deadline, Roberts was asked whether, had she been the right age, she would make Pretty Woman today.
Roberts took her time to consider the notion, musing, “Oh, it’s impossible. I have too many years of the weight of the world inside of me now that I wouldn’t be able to kind of levitate in a movie like that, right?”
She clarified, “I mean, not weight of the world, like, negative, but just all the things that we learn, all the things that we put in our pockets along the lane.”
The Leave the World Behind actor went on, “It would be impossible to play someone who was really innocent, in a way. I mean, it’s a funny thing to say about a hooker, but I do think that there was an innocence to her, a kind of… I guess it’s just being young.”
Pretty Woman was once considered an affectionate tale about love and belonging, but has since been seen in a new light. Commenting on this, Roberts has shared, “Well, I think anytime you have a huge passage of time and cultural shifts…”
Roberts went on, “Think about all the movies and plays of the ’20s and ’30s and ’40s — you would look at them now and just be like, ‘How are people saying these things, doing these things?’”
She shrugged, “Yeah, times change, people change, ideas change.”
Robert’s latest movie, After the Hunt, was released in cinemas at the end of 2025. It stars Ayo Edebiri, Andrew Garfield, and was directed by Call Me by Your Name filmmaker Luca Guadagnino.