Olivia Hussey and Leonard Whiting have filed a lawsuit against Paramount Pictures, accusing the production company of not protecting the child actors when they filmed the 1968 film Romeo and Juliet.
Hussey and Whiting, now in their 70s, were just teenagers when they starred in the well-received Shakespeare film. According to Variety, the two filed a lawsuit in Santa Monica Superior Court on December 30 accusing Paramount of sexually exploiting them and distributing nude images of adolescent children.
The lawsuit refers to the controversial bedroom scene where Whiting’s buttocks and Hussey’s bare breasts were visible.
At the time of filming, Hussey was 15, and Whiting was 16.
The complaint states that the director, Franco Zeffirelli, who died in 2019, assured them there would be no nudity in the film and during an intimate scene the actors would wear flesh colored undergarments.
However, during the final days of filming Zeffirelli reportedly told the actors they had to perform the scene nude with body makeup or else “the Picture would fail.”
He showed the actors where the camera would be positioned and informed them that no nudity would be filmed or photographed.
As it was the last day of filming, Hussey and Whiting believed they had no other option “but to act in the nude with body makeup.”
“What they were told and what went on were two different things,” said Tony Marinozzi, a business manager for both actors. “They trusted Franco. At 16, as actors, they took his lead that he would not violate that trust they had. Franco was their friend, and frankly, at 16, what do they do? There are no options. There was no #MeToo.”
Solomon Gresen, Hussey and Whiting’s attorney, said the two “were very young naive children in the ’60s who had no understanding of what was about to hit them.”
“All of a sudden they were famous at a level they never expected, and in addition they were violated in a way they didn’t know how to deal with.”
Romeo and Juliet went on to receive four Academy Awards nominations and has been shown in classrooms around the country for decades.
The complaint states that both actors suffered “physical and emotional pain, along with extreme and severe mental anguish and emotional distress” since the film’s release.
They also claimed they lost a “lifetime of loss of earnings and other employment benefits and job opportunities” as a result. Despite Romeo and Juliet being both of their breakout performances, neither went on to a very successful career in Hollywood.
Hussey and Whiting are seeking compensation “believed to be in excess of $500,000,000.”
The actors’ lawsuit relies on a California law that temporarily suspended the statute of limitations for older claims of child sexual abuse. The deadline was December 31, 2022.
It will be interesting to see what becomes of this lawsuit. If there is enough evidence, I do hope justice is served because no child should ever be exploited.
