Richard Gere says iconic character was “criminally underwritten”
He may have already been a star by that point, but it’s not without merit to suggest the part of Edward Lewis in Garry Marshall’s classic rom-com Pretty Woman is the most iconic role Richard Gere has ever played.
The actor was already established as one of his generation’s foremost heartthrobs after his breakout turn in American Gigolo shot him into the cinematic stratosphere, which he swiftly followed up with An Officer and a Gentleman, The Cotton Club, and No Mercy, among others.
However, generating boundless chemistry opposite Julia Roberts in what turned out to be the star-making performance of her own career captivated audiences like no other, with Pretty Woman racing to a colossal $463 million at the global box office.
Not only is it still the highest-grossing movie he’s ever been in, but it reigned as the top-earning R-rated film ever distributed by Disney until 2024’s Deadpool & Wolverine. Ironically, the studio wasn’t entirely sold on the project until it underwent some major revisions, and the same sentiment applied to Gere’s character.
The most important ingredient in Pretty Woman‘s success was the rapport between the two leads, which Gere continues downplaying with tongue planted firmly in cheek. “No chemistry,” he said per Deadline. “I mean, this actor and this actress obviously had no chemistry between them.”
One of the most famous scenes from Pretty Woman features Gere and Roberts sitting behind a piano and letting their sizzling chemistry do the talking. The leading man revealed that the scene was heavily improvised on the day, allowing him to put his own stamp on a role he didn’t think was fully realised on the page.
“This was never in the script,” he shared. “We didn’t know how we would use it later. It ended up being integral to the film.” Gere described Lewis as “a character that was almost criminally underwritten,” one who existed as “basically a suit and a good haircut.”
When given the chance to improvise and start “playing something moody that was about this character’s interior life,” the actor stumbled upon “a mysterious yearning and maybe a damaged quality to this guy” that he brought to the remainder of his performance using spur-of-the-moment decisions when cameras were rolling to elevate the character to where he wanted it to be.
It’s still the movie people tend to ask him about the most, and Gere continues to dish out new information on the production more than 30 years later.
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