Regarding the home distribution of the movie, Olivia Hussey and Leonard Whiting, the stars of 1968’s “Romeo & Juliet,” have launched a fresh legal action against Paramount Pictures and the Criterion Collection.
The latest application asks for “preliminary and permanent injunction that the Digital Release not be distributed with the Digital Photos included.”
The term “Digital Photos” refers to pictures that director Franco Zeffirelli took while filming “Romeo & Juliet” and which are included in the 2023 release. These pictures show both actors in nude while still minors, and they “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.”
The performers want “damages in a sum according to proof that is adequate to compensate Hussey and Whiting for the general injuries suffered as hereinabove alleged,” such as “emotional distress, embarrassment, humiliation, and mental anguish.”
At sixteen, Olivia Hussey recalls her controversial role in “ROMEO and Juliette” and discloses personal tragedies.
According to the lawsuit, nothing in the contract gave Paramount, doing business as B.H.E. Productions Ltd., permission to “recreate, republish, or redistribute photographs of her performance in the [‘Romeo & Juliet’] in any other medium or format than 35 mm analogue cinematographic photographs,” as claimed by Hussey and Whiting.
On behalf of the actors, Tony Marinozzi, who represents both Whiting and Hussey, gave a statement.
