4 min readNew DelhiJan 5, 2023 07:20 AM IST
First published on: Jan 4, 2023 at 04:22 PM IST
The lead actors of Romeo and Juliet have sued Paramount Pictures for more than $500 million, over a nude scene in the 1968 movie, which was shot when they were teenagers.
Olivia Hussey (71) and Leonard Whiting (72) were then 15 and 16 years old, respectively. They have sued the studio in Los Angeles County Superior Court for sexual abuse, sexual harassment and fraud, the AP reported.
Why have the actors alleged fraud and sexual abuse? Why have they filed the case more than 50 years after the Oscar-winning film’s release? We explain.
What are the allegations?
The actors have claimed that they were pushed into doing the nude scene through lies and manipulation.
The scene depicts Romeo and Juliet in bed together after getting married. The actors’ suit alleges that movie director Franco Zeffirelli initially told them they would wear flesh-colored clothes in the scene. However, on the day of the shoot, he told them they would have to wear nothing but body makeup, but the camera would be so positioned that it would not show nudity, the AP reported. The scene does show both the teenaged actors partially naked, and thus, the suit now claims they were filmed in the nude without their knowledge, flouting laws against indecency and the exploitation of children.
The suit also said Zeffirelli told the actors they must act in the nude “or the picture would fail”. The actors “believed they had no choice but to act in the nude in body makeup as demanded.”
The suit alleged the pair have suffered “mental anguish and emotional distress” in the years since and have lost out on job opportunities, reported The Guardian.
At the time, both Hussey and Whiting had won Golden Globes, but they have claimed the success they experienced was not equal to what the movie saw. Zeffirelli’s adaptation of William Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet remains a classic, often serving as American schoolchildren’s introduction to the work.
“What they were told and what went on were two different things,” Tony Marinozzi, a business manager for the actors, was quoted as saying by The Guardian. “They trusted Franco [Zeffirelli]. 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.” Paramount is yet to react to the suit, while Zeffirelli died in 2019.
Why has the lawsuit been filed now?
In 2020, the state of California gave people a three-year window to file complaints of child sexual abuse even if the statute of limitations for their case had expired. The window was set to close on December 31, and Hussey and Whiting’s suit was filed on December 30.
After the December 31 deadline, people above the age of 40 will not be able to file cases for sexual abuse they suffered as children in California.
Solomon Gresen, who is representing the actors, told AFP that while decades have passed since Romeo and Juliet was made, that has not lessened the damage done, especially as it has been re-released. “(Paramount) have images that they know are images of underage nudity that should be removed from the film. That would be the beginning for sure,” Gresen said.
Hussey and Whiting are not the only people who have used the three-year window for old complaints. According to a Los Angeles Times report from December 28, thousands of lawsuits have been filed, with more than 2,000 against the Catholic Church.
Olivia Hussey and Leonard Whiting, who are playing the title roles in Franco Zeffirelli's "Romeo and Juliet," place flowers on the "Tomba di Giulietta", or the Tomb of Juliet, in Verona, northern Italy, on Oct. 22, 1968. (AP Photo/File) 
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