After preview screenings the ending was slightly altered so the relationship between the Michael Gallagher character played by Paul Newman and the Megan Carter character played by Sally Field was left open-ended and not close-ended. This is an old Hollywood movie chestnut where if love interests do not end up together, so as to have a happy ending, there needs to be a suggestion that the pair might see each other or get together romantically after the picture's end, and as such, the guy kinda gets the girl, or might get the girl, in the end. This was the clear intention of producer and director Sydney Pollack. This production scenario was reported in the 23rd November 1981 edition of 'New York' magazine. Moreover, the same ending suggestion happens at the end of Pollack's Tootsie (1982), where are Jessica Lange and Dustin Hoffman's characters have fallen out, they walk down the boulevard at film's end, with Hoffman putting his arm around Lange at the end of the closing shot.