Olivia Hussey, star of the 1968 “Romeo & Juliet” film directed by Franco Zeffirelli, wants her and her co-star’s concerns to be heard.
She and Leonard Whiting, who played Romeo in the film, filed a new lawsuit this year against Paramount and Criterion over a “digitally enhanced” re-release of the film in 2023 they say puts undue focus on the nude scene they never properly consented to in the first place.
Speaking via email with Fox News Digital, Hussey explained, “What Paramount and Criterion have now done is publicly release a version of the film that technically enhances the film but, to my shock and dismay, also enhances my ‘underage’ nude body and that entire bedroom scene, including Leonard’s body, in something one may see in pornographic photos, magazines or films.”
She continued, referring back to the day of filming, saying, “They made a deliberate and calculated choice. They manipulated both of us into acting a graphic sexual scene with nudity, sexually exploiting us and, frankly, scaring us at the last minute by threatening that if we didn’t, we would be in trouble and that the film would not succeed without it.”
“Romeo and Juliet” star Olivia Hussey, along with co-star Leonard Whiting, is suing Paramount and Criterion over the release of a digitally enhanced version of the film they say puts focus on their nude scene, filmed while they were both underage. (Tara Ziemba/WireImage)
“Now they have released the entire film accentuating our already naked bodies by ways that are available to them now. It was a horrible situation to be put in then, and now it’s visually even more disturbing and horrific for us at that age to be portrayed in such a salacious way.”
On Valentine’s Day this year, the actors filed a new lawsuit against Paramount Pictures and the Criterion Collection over the home release of the film.
The new filing seeks a “preliminary and permanent injunction that the Digital Release not be distributed with the Digital Photos included.”
The “Digital Photos” refer to a scene that features both actors nude while underage that is included in the 2023 release, which “had been digitally enhanced such that, unlike the Original Work, the Digital Release depicted their private areas in such high detail that the gratuitous display was lewd and lascivious and demeaning to them.”
Hussey and Whiting are seeking a “preliminary and permanent injunction” for the enhanced version of “Romeo and Juliet.” (Chris Delmas/AFP via Getty Images)
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In Hussey’s opinion, Paramount’s refusal to listen to her and Whiting was comparable to “revenge porn.”
“My psychologist, Dr. Stacy Feiner, also made me aware of the term ‘revenge porn’ and how it applies to Paramount’s releasing a new version of the film that enhances our naked bodies, which, by the way, was an enormous tool used in the marketing campaign by them to sell the original film (in 1968) in the first place,” Hussey said.
She continued, “So, after we filed our first lawsuit (in 2022), it appears that Paramount pushed the enhancement of our naked bodies for the new film release (in 2023) as far as they could to punish us in some sick, vindictive way … perhaps thinking that this would silence us and we would just go away.
“They, with this new version and all its colorization and enhancement of the two of us in that bedroom scene, definitely emphasize the sexual nature of the Romeo and Juliet attraction, which totally detracts any of the softness and what was left of our innocence, which was compromised.”
Fox News Digital reached out to both Paramount and Criterion for comment.
Hussey feels the re-release of the scene with the enhancements is comparable to “revenge porn.” (Bettman)
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Hussey and Whiting previously filed a lawsuit against Paramount Pictures, which claimed that the nude scene in question in the 1968 film was child pornography and that the pair had been sexually abused while filming it, seeking $500 million in damages.
The judge ruled that the film scene was under the protection of the First Amendment, explaining that Hussey and Whiting “have not put forth any authority showing the film here can be deemed to be sufficiently sexually suggestive as a matter of law to be held to be conclusively illegal.”
In that suit, the actors said Zeffirelli originally told them that they would not film nude and would wear flesh-colored garments instead. However, when it came time to film the scene, the director allegedly insisted the two teenagers be nude “or the picture would fail.”
Zeffirelli died in 2019, but his son released a statement denouncing the initial lawsuit.
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Director Franco Zeffirelli is shown with Hussey and Whiting in 1967. Zeffirelli died in 2019, but his son, Pippo, denounced the actors’ previous lawsuit that alleged the film constituted child pornography. (Evening Standard/Hulton Archive/Getty Images)
“It is embarrassing to hear that today, 55 years after filming, two elderly actors who owe their notoriety essentially to this film wake up to declare that they have suffered an abuse that has caused them years of anxiety and emotional discomfort,” Pippo Zeffirelli told The Guardian in a statement.
Hussey shared her recollection of filming the original scene in her response to Fox News Digital, noting she and Whiting felt misled and pressured to perform the scene.
“We had no feelings of anything being wrong until we arrived at work. Leonard and I were previously told one thing, which was that we would be wearing flesh-colored undergarments, and then the morning of this particularly sensitive bedroom scene, everything that had been previously discussed (wearing flesh-colored undergarments) and agreed upon … literally vanished,” she recalled.
“I arrived in the morning of the bedroom scene filming to my dressing room with the flesh-colored undergarments laid out for me. Moments later, the male makeup artist came into my room to inform me that ‘by instructions’ from Franco that I was to be made up totally nude. My entire body … naked. I immediately ran out looking for Franco and said this was never discussed and that I didn’t understand what was happening.”
Hussey said she and Whiting had no concerns about the scene before they were told “the morning of” that they would no longer be allowed to wear flesh-toned undergarments for their nude scene. (Höhn/ullstein bild via Getty Images)
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“Franco sternly replied that it was very necessary to the film that we see no panty lines or straps of any kind, and this is how we will proceed. He assured us that nobody will see anything inappropriate or revealing.”
She added, “Myself, I was in a total panic.”
Hussey said she and Whiting “both felt like deer in the headlights with no one to protect us or even to question this last-minute decision by Franco. We felt trapped and tried our best to put on a brave front and be professional … and we convincingly did so for 50-plus years, even promoting the film and the bedroom scene as if we had no regrets over it.”
“But make no mistake, we both had serious misgivings buried deep within our souls behind our human masks. But those masks have now crumbled upon the release of the digitally enhanced version of the film. And we now can clearly see what we were actually promised that we would never see … our sexualized nude bodies.”
Hussey said her mother, who signed the contract allowing her to be in the film, “would have never done so” if she had been made aware of the nude scene. (Silver Screen Collection/Getty Images)
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She also explained that at the time of filming, her and Whiting’s parents were never made aware of what happened on set, and they were “told by Franco that it was a closed set, meaning only a limited number of professionals had access to the filming.”
The “Black Christmas” star noted her lawyer has seen the original contract and that there is no mention of nudity within it.
“I can absolutely assure you that my mother, who signed the contract as my legal guardian, would have never done so or allowed me to participate in a production that would require or mention the possibility of me being nude in it,” Hussey said.
Hussey made clear that the current lawsuit is about the digitally enhanced scene in the re-release of the film and the focus put on their nudity in the scene.
Hussey says she and Whiting, seen here with Zeffirelli, “had serious misgivings buried deep within our souls” about the scene that they hid behind “masks” that have now come down with the newly enhanced version of the film. (AP Photo/Eustache Cardenas)
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“What Paramount and Criterion did by deliberately modernizing and digitally enhancing our naked images truly glorified and brought such an obvious intent to feature the photos in question beyond anything I could have imagined,” she said.
“In the original film, although still disturbing to me, [it] at least could be viewed as a bit more subtle and the innocence of youth and beauty seemed more seamless. The attention was not drawn specifically to the nudity and was less detracting to the overall scene,” she continued.
“In the 2023 digital remake, the emphasis and focus on the nudity is undeniable. The high resolution and modernization is now emphasizing sexuality, which draws the audience to the sexual aspect rather than the scene as a whole.”
“Its main focus now is our nude bodies: Leonard’s vivid bare buttocks and my vividly enhanced breasts. The scene now is more a sexual encounter rather than the relationship. The night of our wedding and the love and innocence the characters share was supposed to be the premise of the story.”
Hussey says she and Whiting feel that the nude scene, being digitally enhanced, now has too much emphasis on its “sexuality.” (Larry Ellis/Express/Getty Images)
William Romaine and Zishan Lokhandwala of Romaine Lokhandwala Law Group, the lawyers representing Hussey and Whiting, spoke with Fox News Digital via phone about the case.
“There’s nothing in Shakespeare’s portfolio that requires this, these images,” Lokhandwala said. “The appropriate thing to have been done would have been to remove those images. Instead, they digitally enhanced those objectionable images and released a film in 2023, which is wrong.”
He added, “I want to make it clear our clients have never received any money in any way whatsoever in connection with the 2023 digital film, and they never signed any consent as to such.”
Hussey said she hopes her lawsuit with Whiting will “result in accountability for those who have unlawfully and knowingly used these new digital means and technology to deliberately enhance and exploit our underage nude bodies.” (Chad Buchanan/Getty Images)
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“They didn’t know about this particular release, unfortunately, until after everything was all over [and] it was too late,” Romaine said. “It’s not like they got out of that suit and we went hunting.”
Romaine, who along with Lokhandwala was not involved in the first suit, said the actors are planning on appealing that case separately, “But for the most part they were ready to accept the defeat. And then along comes this digitally enhanced film that jumps in their face, humiliates them and puts them in a light that they never agreed to be in, that they never, ever thought would be thrown at them like that.”
He continued, “And certainly not only did it recreate Zeffirelli’s betrayal of their confidence, it actually humiliated them as mature adults in their later years. So, all of that together was a perfect storm.”
Romaine also noted that knowing this was done once, his clients were concerned, “What happens if next time they take our digital photos and next time make it look like we’re actually engaged [in intercourse].”
Ultimately, Hussey hopes her and Whiting’s legal action will “result in accountability for those who have unlawfully and knowingly used these new digital means and technology to deliberately enhance and exploit our underage nude bodies … and to serve as a deterrent and prevent this from ever happening to anyone in the future.”
“The impact from our voices is evident, and we will continue to encourage others to stand up to those with financial power and influential networks and not be intimidated,” she added.
