Julia Roberts likes scaring her children.

In an interview with Ellen DeGeneres the actress revealed she enjoys playing pranks on her kids Henry, four, and seven-year-old twins Hazel and Phinnaeus.

The 44-year-old actress plays the Evil Queen in new Snow White film Mirror Mirror and Julia joked she is just as frightening at home.

"If I hear them coming and they don't know where I am in the house, I crouch down in their private space and [when] they come in, I jump out," she told the talk show host.

"Really, little people can just catch air. They just vault."

However, Julia would not allow her children on the set of the film for certain shoots as she felt her character was too terrifying. She prefers to leave her scare tactics for home life.

"They were never there when I was talking, because I only say wretched things," she said, before adding she realised she should stop her antics.

"I realised I was getting too much joy from it, so I've had to tone it down. It's so wrong. It's like child abuse."

Julia was given a taste of her own medicine before the taping of the show when Ellen hid in the star's bathroom and jumped out. She was also given a fright later when a man in a Snow White costume snuck up behind her on stage.

"You said, 'Now I know how my kids feel,'" Ellen said later on the show.