Romeo & Juliet Stars Sue Paramount Over Nude Scene: “We Were Minors and Misled”
Decades later, Leonard Whiting and Olivia Hussey sue Paramount, alleging they were deceived into filming a nude scene as teens in Romeo & Juliet. Here’s what we know.
Leonard Whiting and Olivia Hussey, the legendary stars of Romeo and Juliet, have dropped a bombshell lawsuit against Paramount Pictures. The actors, now in their 70s, are accusing the studio of sexual exploitation after being misled into filming a nude scene when they were just teens.
Filed on December 30 in Santa Monica, the lawsuit comes with some heavy allegations — exploitation, sexual harassment, fraud, and distributing nude images of minors. Whiting was 16, and Hussey was 15 during filming. The two are now seeking over $500 million in damages, claiming they’ve suffered “mental anguish” and missed job opportunities ever since. “Paramount owed a duty to protect their minor children employees from child and sexual exploitation,” the lawsuit states.
At the heart of the controversy is the film’s intimate bedroom scene. The actors claim Zeffirelli assured them they’d wear flesh-colored undergarments with no nudity shown. But in the final days of filming, the director allegedly pressured them to perform nude, warning the movie “would fail” otherwise. They also allege Zeffirelli filmed them naked without their knowledge, capturing glimpses of Hussey’s breasts and Whiting’s buttocks in the final cut.
“What they were told and what went on were two different things,” said Tony Marinozzi, the actors’ business manager, in a Variety interview. “They trusted Franco. At 16, as actors, they took his lead so he would not violate their trust. Franco was their friend, and frankly, at 16, what do they do? There are no options. There was no #MeToo.”
The lawsuit was filed under a California law temporarily suspending the statute of limitations for child sexual abuse claims. Solomon Gresen, the actors’ attorney, told Variety, “Nude images of minors are unlawful and shouldn’t be exhibited. These were very young, naive children in the ’60s who did not understand what would hit them. Suddenly, they were famous at a level they never expected, and they were violated in a way they didn’t know how to deal with.”
Ironically, Hussey previously defended the scene in a 2018 Fox News interview, calling it “done very tastefully” and “not that big of a deal.” This contradiction highlights the lawsuit’s central claim: that the actors, as minors, were manipulated into downplaying their discomfort for years.
Romeo and Juliet was a critical and commercial triumph, earning four Oscar nominations and immortalizing Whiting and Hussey as the definitive star-crossed lovers. Hussey went on to star in Black Christmas and Death on the Nile, while Whiting appeared in The Royal Hunt of the Sun. The pair reunited in 2015’s Social Suicide. Yet, the shadow of Zeffirelli’s film has lingered.
This lawsuit reignites conversations about consent, power dynamics, and the exploitation of young actors in pre-#MeToo Hollywood. While Romeo and Juliet remains a cinematic gem, its legacy now carries a troubling asterisk. As Marinozzi succinctly put it, “Nude images of minors are unlawful and shouldn’t be exhibited.” Five decades later, Whiting and Hussey finally demand their reckoning.
