“Romeo, Romeo, Wherefore art thou, Romeo?” Is there a more iconic play by the Bard than Romeo and Juliet? Surely Hamlet or Macbeth are up there, but Romeo and Juliet is, in my opinion, even more iconic and has served as the inspiration for so many films, including the Academy Award-winning West Side Story. Virtually everyone knows Romeo and Juliet. It has been adapted many times over the years, including the 1968 version, which, to date, is the last William Shakespeare play to be nominated for Best Picture, even though it heavily influences the 1998 winner, Shakespeare in Love. This 1968 film was, for many, the version to see, playing in every high school literature classroom as an example of Shakespeare’s talent for words. Sadly, in recent years, it has become the source of controversy and is mostly remembered for a split-second moment that the lead actors have contested in court in the last few years, right up until Olivia Hussey’s passing just a week ago.
This is the version of the play that many of us saw in school for the simple reason that it dumbed down the politics and focused more on the love story, a detail that many of us hormonal teens could understand and appreciate. In my school, this meant that a certain scene had to be censored by the teacher to protect our fragile little minds from any nudity, lest someone’s parents file a complaint with the school board. My teacher would stand next to the little CRT we were watching it on and hold up a sheet of paper to block the screen until the offending moment was over. Just a little detail I remember from childhood.
While I remember the presentation of the film, the movie itself only vaguely stayed with me over the years. When I started watching it again for this review, I was surprised to find that it focuses so much on the lust the two leads have for each other. This is not a mature romance that builds up between two people but an animal lust between two horny teenagers. While this aspect exists in the original play, it is more a representation of the times in which the film was made and who was directing it. 1968 was in the middle of the Vietnam War, political unrest, and the rise of the sexual revolution. People were sleeping around a lot more freely and expressing their rampant sexuality much more than in previous decades.
We were also seeing an increase in the visibility of homosexuality at the time, even though it was still very much a closeted issue back then. Hence, director Franco Zeffirelli, who was outspoken against homosexuality but turned out to be gay himself, shot this film in such a way that it’s hard to hide the homosexual gaze of it all. During the infamous nudity scene where the leads, Leonard Whiting and Olivia Hussey, are clearly naked, there is a lingering shot of Leonard from the back, whereas Olivia is caught so briefly that you might question if it was there at all. This was atypical for a film of the late 60s, where it is usually the female form that would get the lingering gratuitous shot.
This is a film that is, by its very nature, designed to lure people into a love for Shakespeare. It simplifies the text at times without compromising the beautiful poetry of the Bard. Gone are many of the elongated soliloquies in favor of more direct dialogue, while at the same time, the language retains much of the complex elegance of the iambic pentameter that populates Shakespeare’s works. This has the effect of making the film more available to the youth audience of the 60s while not offending the more serious fans of Shakespeare’s work.
By aiming this film at the youth audience, though, Franco has amped up the eroticism of the plot. At the time of release and for many years afterwards, Whiting and Hussey have stated in numerous interviews that the eroticism was done tastefully and respectfully, having nothing negative to say about the production or of Franco himself. Then suddenly in 2023, both actors filed a lawsuit against Paramount Pictures alleging sexual abuse, sexual harassment, and fraud, alleging that they were filmed in the nude without their knowledge and consent. Their previous statements that the scene was necessary and done tastefully was jettisoned, and they were seeking half a billion dollars in damages.
Of course, that suit was thrown out as it was past the statute of limitations, and nothing they said justified suspending the statute. When the film was rereleased for home video, they tried to sue again, stating this constituted a new violation and didn’t qualify for the original statute. That suit was also thrown out. Now that Olivia has passed away, it seems unlikely a third suit will be brought by Whiting alone. The primary reason for both dismissals has been the attitude expressed by both performers in the decades since the film released, which makes these suits feel like a cash grab rather than a legitimate grievance. Of course, only Whiting and Hussey know for sure the true reason behind bringing this suit so many years after the fact.
By bringing this suit in the first place, it has tarnished the legacy of this film and sullied its reputation. Olivia Hussey was fifteen at the time of filming, which meant that special permissions had to be signed off on in Italy, where it was filmed, to get the shots. Whiting was sixteen and of the age of consent at the time. I refuse to take sides on the situation as I wasn’t there to witness what really happened, but I am skeptical based on the timing of it all.
This is the film that most people from my generation remember when thinking about adaptations of Romeo and Juliet. It stays true to the setting and the feel of the original play while making it accessible to the youth of the 60s. Both Romeo and Juliet are played age-appropriately, that is to say, immature and filled with sexual desire. There is a level of childishness to both of these characters that is often lost in other versions of this story. These two are very young, and it shows in how both Whiting and, especially, Hussey are playing it. It works for this play and makes these characters relatable in a way that other famous Shakespeare plays can’t. Watching it in the 21st century reveals the datedness of the production but not of the plot and characters, which is as timeless as it ever was. There is a reason all these hundreds of years later that this story still resonates, and adaptations keep being made.
Academy Award Nominations
Best Picture: John Brabourne and Anthony Havelock-Allan
Best Director: Franco Zeffirelli
Best Cinematography: Pasqualino De Santis (won)
Best Costume Design: Danilo Donati (won)
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Release Date: March 5, 1968
Running Time: 138 Minutes
Rated PG
Starring: Leonard Whiting, Olivia Hussey, Milo O’Shea, Michael York, John McEnery, Pat Heywood, Natasha Parry, and Robert Stephens
Directed By: Franco Zeffirelli
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