Romeo and Juliet movie director Franco Zeffirelli, left, actors Olivia Hussey, centre, and Leonard Whiting after the Parisian premiere of the film in 1968
(Picture: AP)Two British stars of the 1968 film Romeo and Juliet are suing Paramount Pictures for more than $500 million over a nude scene in the film shot when they were teenagers.
Olivia Hussey, then 15 and now 71, and Leonard Whiting, then 16 now 72, filed the suit in Los Angeles County Superior Court alleging sexual abuse, sexual harassment and fraud.
The two stars claim director Franco Zeffirelli, originally told them there would not be any nudity in the film but then told them on the day the scene was shot they must act in the nude “or the Picture would fail” and their careers would be hurt.
Zeffirelli, who died in 2019, initially told the pair, who won Golden Globes for their performances in the movie, that they would wear flesh-coloured undergarments in the bedroom scene that was shot on the final days of filming, the suit alleges.
But on the morning of the shoot, Zeffirelli told Whiting, who played Romeo, and Hussey, who played Juliet, that they would wear only body makeup, while still assuring them the camera would be positioned in a way that would not show nudity, according to the suit.
Yet they were filmed in the nude without their knowledge, in violation of California and federal laws against indecency and the exploitation of children, the suit says.
The pressure put on them meant the actors “believed they had no choice but to act in the nude in body makeup as demanded”, the suit claims.
Whiting’s bare buttocks and Hussey’s bare breasts are briefly shown during the scene.
The film, and its theme song, were major hits at the time, and has been shown to generations of high school students studying the Shakespeare play since.
The court filing says the Hussey and Whiting, who won a Golden Globe for his performance in the film, have suffered emotional damage and mental anguish for decades, and that each had careers that did not reflect the success of the movie.
It says given that suffering and the revenue brought in by the film since its release, the actors are entitled to damages of more than $500 million.
Paramount has been contacted for comment.
The lawsuit was filed under a California law temporarily suspending the statute of limitations for child sex abuse, which has led to a host of new lawsuits and the revival of many others that were previously dismissed.
Hussey, who has won a Golden Globe defended the scene in a 2018 interview with Variety, which first reported the lawsuit, for the film’s 50th anniversary.
“Nobody my age had done that before,” she said, adding that Zeffirelli shot it tastefully. “It was needed for the film.”
