Colorized

The bare-chested, loin cloth-wearing Johnny Weissmuller and Maureen O’Sullivan, with her scanty, hip-high costume, seen here in a colorized photo from 1932, caused a stir when they appeared together in the 1932 action film Tarzan the Ape Man. One of the most popular films of pre-code Hollywood, the near nudity of the jungle adventure, based on the novel by Edgar Rice Burroughs, Tarzan the Ape Man was the first of a dozen Tarzan films starring Weissmuller.

Johnny Weissmuller and Maureen O'Sullivan. (flickr.com Colorized by Steve Foster)

Just a few years into the Tarzan franchise of films, the Hays Code was enacted in Hollywood. Was this the end to Johnny Weissmuller’s loincloth? Nope. The code wasn’t too worried about Weissmuller’s chiseled chest. It was more concerned about Maureen O’Sullivan. The problem was not so much what she was wearing as what she wasn’t wearing.

Casting Tarzan

Weissmuller was one of the best swimmers of the 20th century. (emirates247.com)

When Hollywood studio Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer decided to make a movie version of the Edgar Rice Burroughs novel about the wild, jungle man, the studio executives sought the perfect actors to play Tarzan and Jane. When Cyril Hume, a writer for MGM, saw former Olympic swimming champion Johnny Weissmuller, who had five gold medals and numerous world records to his name, he knew he had found his Tarzan. Since retiring from competitive swimming, Weissmuller had parlayed his athletic accomplishments, handsome good looks, and muscular body into a lucrative career as an underwear model. When MGM gave Weissmuller a screen test, it was clear that Weissmuller could be a Hollywood star. He ended up appearing in twelve Tarzan films.

Now, Jane

Maureen O'Sullivan is the mother of Mia Farrow. (bizarrela.com)

Irish born Maureen O’Sullivan travelled to California in 1929 in hopes of making a go of acting. Two years later, she had a contract with Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer. Under contract, she appeared in whatever movies she was told to film. Her work caught the eye of Irving Thalberg, an executive at MGM. Young, fresh-faced, and pretty, Maureen O’Sullivan was tapped to star as Jane in Tarzan the Ape Man. She starred in six Tarzan films between 1932 and 1942.

The Pre-Code Era of Hollywood

In the early 1930s, the film industry was under scrutiny by morality critics. (loa.org)

For a five-year span, between 1929 through 1934, Hollywood released many films that raised some eyebrows. With no rules or regulations, some of the movies were quite progressive and liberal in their subject matters, costumes, and dialog. The bulk of the complaints seemed to focus on female characters and how sexy the actresses looked. It seems that strong, female characters who embraced their sexuality were problematic for critics. Now called the pre-code era of Hollywood, the films of this period, the free-wheeling film material came to an end in 1934 when Will H. Hays, the president of the Motion Pictures Producers and Distributors of America instituted a set of regulations and standards that became called as the Hays Code.

The Trouble with Tarzan the Ape Man

O'Sullivan's costume before and after the Hays Code. (pinterest.com)

Johnny Weissmuller, as an Olympic swimmer and underwear model, was quite comfortable wearing very little clothing. The costume designers working on the film had no trouble crafting a loin cloth for him to wear. As for O’Sullivan, her jungle costume was quite revealing. The two-piece outfit was nothing more than a string around her waist with flaps of cloth covering the front and back, showing her entire hip and side.

The Costume Wasn’t the Issue

The skinny dipping scene cause a stir. (pinterest.com)

For morality critics, it wasn’t the skimpy costume that Maureen O’Sullivan wore that caused the stir. Instead, critics were upset about a two-and-a-half minute swimming scene that was the problem. When Johnny Weissmuller signed on to play Tarzan, the MGM execs added more swimming scenes into Tarzan the Ape Man, to take advantage of their Olympic swimming star. In one scene, Weissmuller’s Tarzan swims with Jane. While he kept his loincloth on, Jane is totally naked. Through creative cinematography, lighting, and camera tricks, the audience gets the idea that Jane is sans clothing, although the scene is not too provocative. For this scene, O’Sullivan doesn’t even appear. A body double, Olympic swimmer Josephine McKim, filled in for O’Sullivan and skinny dipped with Tarzan. Regardless of who was swimming, the scene crossed the line for many viewers.

International Sex Symbols

The movie was the top grossing film of 1932. (twitter.com)

When Tarzan the Ape Man was released in 1932, it was a huge success. In fact, it was the top grossing movie that year. Johnny Weissmuller, who was already a household name thanks to his Olympic glory, had cemented his spot as the first international male sex symbol. Maureen O’Sullivan also struck Tarzan gold. Like her co-star, she was known for her sultry beauty and attractive figure, which we can see in this colorized photograph from Tarzan the Ape Man.