Director Michael Showalter and author Colleen Hoover reveal the ending to erotic thriller “Verity” was very different before focus group screenings steered them in another direction.
\n\nSPOILER ALERT: This article contains spoilers for “Verity,” now playing in theaters.
\n\nTo say that “Verity,” a new erotic thriller featuring the ubiquitous Anne Hathaway and Dakota Johnson — who gets to call the former “a selfish, Machiavellian cunt” — has sharply divided critics would be an understatement. This thing has taken a bigger beating than a piece of beef hanging in Rocky Balboa’s meat locker (our own critic called it a “a flat-footed dud”). And the majority of the film’s detractors took issue with its ending. (It is still predicted to win the box office weekend, becoming Hathaway’s third No. 1 movie this year.)
\n\nDirected by Michael Showalter (“Search Party”) and adapted from Colleen Hoover’s bestselling novel, the film tells the tale of Lowen Ashleigh (Johnson), a struggling young author who’s recruited by Jeremy (Josh Hartnett), the hot husband of novelist Verity Crawford (Hathaway), to ghostwrite the final book in her popular series from their secluded (and palatial) house in the woods. You see, Verity suffered a recent accident that’s not only left…
Original source: https://variety.com/