Cistus too "leggy"

I have 3 cistuses (cisti?!) in the garden of the house we have recently moved to. All look a bit leggy and haven't flowered particularly brilliantly this summer. Can I cut them back hard? Really hard? Do they recover from that? Any advice would be much appreciated.

 

My experience with Cistus over the years is that if you cut them back hard they will either grow back with renewed vigour....or they will die. Simple as that.
There seems to be no middle ground, they simply do one or the other.
We had a bed at work which had about 15 to 20 cistus. They were looking a bit leggy and sad after a hard winter, so we went for the nuclear option and cut them back hard.
Result? About 50/50; half came back, half died.
If you don't want to risk losing them, you could try cutting them back by about half now, then reducing them by another third or so after flowering next year.

 

I've got several Cistus and all of them get cut back hard and all improve for it, so i think the general consensus is to try it and see, being cautious if you're not that confident.