Tragedy for Juliet: Olivia Hussey was catapulted to fame aged 15 – but has faced many challenges

Winning the role of Juliet in Franco Zeffirelli’s Romeo and Juliet was a blessing and a curse for 15-year-old Argentinian actress Olivia Hussey.

While it was the defining acting role of her career, she has come together with her co-star Leonard Whiting, 72, to sue Paramount Pictures over the nude scene they filmed when they were just 15 and 16 years old.

The film’s success introduced her to fame and glamour, exposing her to terrible grief and self-doubt with two tumultuous marriages, a crippling case of agoraphobia, neurotic panic attacks, food compulsions, pot smoking, drinking and pills.

Here FEMAIL reveals the highs and lows of Olivia’s time in the spotlight. 

Olivia was born in  Buenos Aires, Argentina, the first child of Argentine opera singer Andrés Osuna and Joy, a legal secretary originally from England.

The couple split when she was just two years old, her parents separated.

Even as a child, she was fascinated by acting and would dress up and pretend to be a nun.

At the age of seven, she joined her mother and brother and moved to London, where she was enrolled in a drama school.

While it was the defining acting role of her career, she has come together with her co-star Leonard Whiting, 72, to sue Paramount Pictures over the nude scene they filmed when they were just 15 and 16 years old

In her 2018 memoir, she claimed she was raped and abused by her ex Christopher Jones (left), before her husband Dino Martin cheated on her whilst she was pregnant (right) 

Meanwhile she suffered crippling anxiety which meant she didn’t act for two years after the success of the film, and struggled when networking – even wetting herself when she met the Queen 

Aged 13, she began to act professionally on stage.

She caught the eye of producer Franco Zeffirelli after he saw her perform in the West End show The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie.

He later said he noticed her because ‘she was the only choice mature enough with experience and natural beauty to play Juliet while still looking 14.’ 

The intoxicating spotlight that overnight celebrity ushered in – something the young girl had dreamed of since age four – also brought on a weight gain that required diet pills morning and night making her hyper and stressed out.

The studio demanded she see a specialist for being ‘plump’, something that had never bothered her – but it did the studio.

‘I began to hate my body and this warped body image would turn into a compulsion,’ Hussey wrote in her memoir, The Girl on the Balcony.

‘Where once I saw food as a great joy, I now began to see it as an enemy. I have never really had a slim body type. It’s more buxom or curvy,’ Hussey writes, and quotes Sophia Loren who once said, ‘Everything you see I owe to pasta’.

The actress said she hated wearing the ‘dreaded bodice’ that pushed up her breasts and made her look voluptuous. Director Franco Zeffirelli (pictured) would take her hands and say, ‘Oh, my little Boobs O’Mina’ 

Olivia caught the eye of producer Franco Zeffirelli after he saw her perform in the West End show The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie and was cast in Romeo and Juliet 

Hussey’s mother quickly put an end to the pills and specialists but ‘a seed had been planted’.

With all this attention while filming Romeo and Juliet in the Roman countryside and being looked after by a chaperone, Hussey admits she was ‘budding into a little diva.’

The once, sweet and shy teenager was no more. She became petulant, a brat, opinionated and quick to judge others as well as taking no advice.

Before filming actually began, Olivia says she felt severe cramping and sudden stabbing pains through her whole body, ‘lightning bolts of pain’ that had been brought on by stress or too much food.

It was something she had experienced before – rumbling appendicitis – but the director wanted her appendix out without delay.

Olivia was terrified – this far from home and alone. ‘After a terrible night of self-recrimination and pain, I woke up feeling better’.

‘Whether the problem had been stress, exhaustion, or too much focaccia, I didn’t know. All I cared about was that I was finally well enough. I could be Juliet’, she writes.

Filming began in a small town in Tuscany with Hussey wearing what became the staple of her wardrobe, a ‘dreaded bodice’, so tight that it had to unlaced down the back after takes to allow her to breathe.

But it pushed up her breasts and made her look voluptuous.

The movie was released in 1968 to critical acclaim and earned Zeffirelli an Academy Award nomination for Best Director

Hussey previously revealed that her breasts attracted her Romeo and an intimacy developed between Olivia and her co-star, Leonard Whiting (pictured).  But the actress writes that she did not sleep with him 

Zeffirelli would take her hands and say, ‘Oh, my little Boobs O’Mina’, something Hussey hated.

But her breasts attracted her Romeo and an intimacy developed between Olivia and her co-star, Leonard Whiting. But the actress writes that she did not sleep with him.

They got drunk together and kissed but he was busy dating every Italian girl between 18 and 35 while she drank gin and tonics and intoxicatingly danced the night away in discos in Rome.

The movie was released in 1968 to critical acclaim and earned Zeffirelli an Academy Award nomination for Best Director. 

Hussey realized she didn’t know how to cultivate relationships and had no one she could ask for advice.

She turned down many viable projects, never learning how to network.

The London opening of the film was a Royal Command Performance before the Queen and royal family at the London Palladium leaving the actress nervous over etiquette for the royal introduction.

She broke out into a fit of giggles, walked onstage with Zeffirelli and Leonard and peed on the spot.

The London opening of the film was a Royal Command Performance before the Queen and royal family at the London Palladium leaving the actress nervous over etiquette for the royal introduction

‘Years later, I would be diagnosed with a severe form of agoraphobia: large crowds, open spaces, and uncontrollable social situations fill me with dread’, writes Hussey.

How Olivia’s co-star Leonard Whiting faced heartache  

Much like Olivia, Leonard Whiting found fame for his role in the 1968 Zeffirelli film version of Romeo and Juliet

Much like Olivia, Leonard Whiting found fame for his role in the 1968 Zeffirelli film version of Romeo and Juliet.

It was a role which earned him the Golden Globe Award for New Star of the Year – Actor.

He went on to appear in a number of other films and TV shows, but ultimately ended his career in the mid 1970s.

He subsequently focused on his theatrical career as an actor and writer. 

In 1971, he married model Cathee Dahmen, welcoming a daughter Sarah Beth Whiting in 1972.

The couple divorced in 1972, and he went on to have a relationship with Valerie Tobin.

She gave birth to a daughter Charlotte, who has said publicly she didn’t meet her father until she was 12. 

In 1995, he married  his assistant, Lynn Presser.

Tragically, his daughter, Sarah Beth Whiting, died in 2014 from cervical cancer.

Pictured with Olivia in 2018: The pair are now suing Paramount Pictures over the nude scene in Romeo & Juliet 

She waved politely at the Queen seated below and escaped for a wardrobe change.

Sitting next to Prince Charles at a long dining table, she complained about how much her feet hurt.

‘Oh, dear. Well, you must go ahead and rest them on my knees, then’, the Prince replied and they carried on talking about films.

It was a year and a half before she accepted another film offer due to her struggle with agoraphobia.

However she was meeting actors and connected with actor Christopher Jones, hot off the film, Wild in the Streets and being talked about as the next James Dean.

Hussey accepted a lunch date that morphed into a romance as well as what she describes as one of the darkest periods of her life.

She had been warned by Jones’s manager, Rudy Altobelli, that Jones might not be the right guy for her, but she read that as Altobelli flirting.

Jones was having a breakdown on the set of Ryan’s Daughter in Ireland, distressing cast and crew. 

He would sit staring off and then abruptly accuse a member of the film crew of stealing from him.

His attacks turned on Hussey, who was 17 at the time, in love and trying to understand her boyfriend.

One night while talking in bed, he allegedly punched her in the stomach and then held her close and apologized.

The production company decided to medicate him and it was up to Hussey to mix it in his morning oatmeal.

His mood swings calmed down on some days, other days he figured he was being poisoned because he felt too good.

Jones threw the bowl of oatmeal at Olivia, insisting she eat it and laughed ghoulishly before running off.

When filming was over, Hussey wanted nothing more to do with the actor and in 1969, she moved to Los Angeles.

First stop, Altobelli’s home on the infamous Cielo Drive in Benedict Canyon, just north of Beverly Hills and the very site of the Charles Manson murder spree earlier that summer.

‘The whole time I lived at Cielo Drive there was nothing strange or macabre about it. I was still very young, and by the time I arrived, all traces of the crime had been erased’ – but for the fact that Altobelli had allowed Christopher to live in the back house temporarily. The ground rules were she would never be left alone with him and Jones understood they were no longer a couple.

Hussey was now caught up in the Hollywood scene of glamorous parties, and meeting big stars. 

She writes she never considered accepting any job offers. She wasn’t feeling anxiety or pressure and just settling into ‘this new, sunnier way of living’.

She met Dino Martin, son of singer Dean Martin and his wife Jeanne. Dino was considered a golden boy, nonchalant about his famous family.

Dino romanced Olivia, took her to all the famous Hollywood restaurants, introduced her to stars and his best friend, Desi Arnaz, Jr., son of Lucille Ball and Desi Arnaz.

The scene at Rudy’s was also exciting with stars dropping by. Sally Kellerman, John Savage, Jack Nicholson even came to smoke a joint.

Olivia then began a short-lived affair with Terry Melcher, Doris Day’s son, a record producer.

Rudy loved smoking dope and Olivia joined him becoming more paranoid throughout the day. Dino would join them and they’d head off to satisfy their munchies.

The role catapulted Olivia to global fame, but she was left feeling overwhelmed by the exposure and suffered crippling anxiety 

But then some dark sinister force brought Christopher Jones into her bedroom one night at Cielo Drive.

Hussey thought one of Rudy’s dogs had pushed open the door but then the door closed. 

Jones was hallucinating and hearing voices, twitching while whispering sweetly but incoherently and then he was suddenly punching and beating Olivia for an hour ‘all the while grinding his teeth and snarling, his spittle spraying me’, she writes.

‘Then he raped me’.

‘In some way, I had always know that it would come to this; that it was only a matter of time before the dam broke and all of Chris’s anger washed over me’, writes Hussey.

She called Dino whose first words were ‘I’m going to have him killed’.

Olivia’s lip was split open. There was dark bruising around her eyes and on the side of her head. He had pulled out a clump of her hair and her nose was bloodied.

She didn’t leave the Cielo Drive house for two months but Dino visited every day.

After Romeo & Juliet was released, Olivia didn’t act for two years – however she later appeared in a number of programmes and films, including The Bastard (pictured, in 1978) 

When she recovered, she went to the gynecologist who confirmed she was pregnant. Conferring with Dino, Rudy, and a psychiatrist, Olivia decided to abort the baby. 

While lying in a bed in Cedar-Sinai hospital before the abortion, when Dino left, Christopher walked in. He apologized and pleaded with her to keep the baby.

She said she couldn’t and that he must never come near her again or she’d reveal that he had viciously raped her.

She rang the nurse’s bell and Christopher exited. Hussey never saw him again.

Jones died in 2014 of complications from gallbladder cancer – after three marriages and seven children.

Dino had been there to support Olivia throughout her ordeal and she fell in love with him.

‘Out of that horror came some of the brightest, happiest days of my life. I was very much in love’, writes Hussey. She also adored Dino’s family.

In 1980 she married a Japanese singer Akira Fuse with whom she had a baby boy before divorcing in 1989

Living between Japan and Hollywood took its toll on Olivia and Akira’s relationship and although they remained friends, they later divorced

They tied the knot in Vegas and Olivia was so into the marriage, she even learned to cook.

When Desi Jr. started dating Liza Minelli, she and Olivia became close friends as well as the godmother of Olivia’s first child.

The two couples spent a lot of time together, flying to Vegas and back the same night, getting tipsy on Saturday nights at Madeo’s, a hot Beverly Hills restaurant, and Sunday morning hitting tennis balls to dispel hangovers.

‘I lived in a strange kind of balance between my newfound love of domestic life and the still-surreal glamour of Hollywood, and it was never boring’.

When the offer came in to work on the film, Summertime Killer, starring Christopher Mitchum and Karl Malden on location in Spain for six weeks, Hussey jumped at it.

Her contract included special lunches to ensure she stay on a diet. When the movie wrapped in Madrid, Barcelona was the next shoot and her diet included one plate of pasta a day and hours at the hotel pool working on her tan.

She has not appeared on screen since 2015, when she appeared in the British film Social Suicide, based on Romeo and Juliet

Once back in LA, she had the taste to work on a bigger film and beat out Natalie Wood for the role of Maria in the big budget film, Lost Horizon.

The location was the Warner Bros. Studio lot. A day after signing, she learned she was pregnant.

She confided her condition to the costume designer who promised to keep it a secret and keep making her wardrobe bigger.

She and Dino had a beautiful baby boy, Alexander Gunther Martin but the marriage turned out to be a flop, as did the film.

Dino had begun cheating on her when Olivia was seven months pregnant.

‘A light had gone out and we both knew it. If we’d been older, perhaps we’d have gone to counseling,’ she writes.

Olivia Hussey seen with ‘Romeo’ Leonard Whiting  at the  2018 TCM Classic Film Festival on April 26, 2018

However, she and Liza fell out after they both tried out for the lead role in the film Camille. 

The glory days were over. Dino was arrested for an illegal gun collection. They sold their house, split the money and went their separate ways.

Binge eating, booze, diet pills, sleeping pills washed down with white wine spritzers –all became routine – until Hussey was introduced to Swami Muktananda, a gentle Indian guru who now became the center of her life and helped lead her out of her misery.

She still had panic attacks and trouble getting outside of her own head.

She met and married a Japanese singer, Akira Fuse, had a baby boy before a third marriage to ‘stone-cold rock star hunk’, David Glenn Eisley, in 1991.

Olivia was diagnosed with stage four breast cancer in the summer of 2008.

However she opted not to pursue chemotherapy or radiation and instead underwent a double mastectomy to treat the cancer.

Hussey has been married to David Eisley since 1991. The two have a daughter, India Eisley (right) who had a role in The Secret Life of the American Teenager 

A decade later, she found the breast cancer had returned when a small tumour was discovered growing between her heart and lungs.

She opted to use radiation and chemotherapy to treat the tumour, stating: “I’d refused chemotherapy and radiation treatment ten years ago, wanting to avoid those poisons, but last year I had no choice, and they saved my life.

‘The tumour shrank, I’m hoping to the size of a pea, and I’m doing well now. I’m healthy and happy.’

She has not appeared on screen since 2015, when she appeared in the British film Social Suicide, based on Romeo and Juliet.  

In 2021, she revealed to DailyMail she was ‘broke’ , saying: ‘I’ve had terrible luck…I went from being comfortable to being overdrawn.’ 

Now, Olivia has joined with Leonard to file a lawsuit Friday in Santa Monica Superior Court in California accusing Paramount Pictures of sexual harassment, fraud, sexual abuse, and intentional infliction of emotional distress.

Hussey, who is now married to third husband David Eisely (pictured), is suing Paramount for $500 million 

Hussey and Whiting have said Zeffirelli originally told them there would not be any nudity in the film.

However, on the last day of filming, they claim he said the film ‘would fail’ unless they performed a scene nude while wearing body makeup. 

‘What they were told and what went on were two different things,’ said Tony Marinozzi, a business manager for the actors, in a statement. 

‘They trusted Franco. At 16, as actors, they took his lead that he would not violate that trust they had,’ the manager said. 

‘Franco was their friend, and frankly, at 16, what do they do?’ Marinozzi added in a statement to the outlet. ‘There are no options. There was no #MeToo.’

The lawsuit alleges the pair were filmed nude without their knowledge and they are now seeking damages ‘believed to be in excess of $500 million.’ 

Read more: 

Stars of 1968 film adaptation of Romeo and Juliet sue Paramount for $500m for ‘forcing them’ into a sex scene when they were just 15 and 16 years old and filming them nude without their knowledge 

Bard news as snowflakes take on Shakespeare: Globe Theatre gives audience trigger warnings over ‘upsetting’ Romeo and Juliet – and even provides a Samaritans helpline number for after the show 

Parents are left outraged over a passionate same-sex kissing scene in a high school performance of Romeo and Juliet