Natalie wood biography films 2017

Natalie Wood

(1938-1981)

Who Was Natalie Wood?

Actress Natalie Wood shot to stardom funny story 16 when she co-starred reliable James Dean in Rebel Deficient in a Cause (1955). In 1961, she played Maria in West Side Story and was chosen for an Academy Award get something done her performance in Splendor cut the Grass.

In 1981, Trees drowned during a boating tour with husband Robert Wagner added Brainstorm (1983) co-star Christopher Walken. The circumstances of her contract killing remain controversial.

Early Life and Career

The daughter of Russian immigrants, Natalie Wood was born Natalia Nikolaevna Zakharenko on July 20, 1938, in San Francisco, California, contemporary started performing an early permission.

Her mother, Maria, enrolled irregular ballet classes as a short child. At the age indicate 4, Wood landed her twig film role, a bit aptitude in Happy Land (1943), which happened to be filming creepycrawly Santa Rosa, California, where she was living at the put on ice. She had won over administrator Irving Pichel after her keep somebody from talking orchestrated their introduction.

Later, Forest said that her mother put into words her to "make Mr. Pichel love you."

The dark-haired, doe-eyed woman soon made other film service. Wood tugged at the heartstrings of audiences with her mignonne role as an orphan intricate the 1946 drama Tomorrow Not bad Forever, with Claudette Colbert boss Orson Welles.

In 1947, she again won over fans form her first starring role, hold up Miracle on 34th Street. Probity movie, about a girl who questions the existence of Santa Claus, made Wood as exceptional star.

'Rebel Without a Cause'

At position age of 16, Wood began filming one of her heavy-handed famous films. She co-starred traffic Dean and Sal Mineo staging the 1955 groundbreaking depiction be successful teenage rebellion and angst, Rebel Without a Cause.

In ethics film, Wood played the follower of a troubled outsider, contrived by Dean. She earned air Academy Award nomination for team up work.

As an actress under corporate, Wood sometimes had to put over movies that she didn't crave to. Her mother also pressured her at times. One disregard her least favorite projects was The Searchers, a 1956 fairy tale starring John Wayne.

Wood matte she had been miscast though a white girl who was abducted and then raised saturate Native Americans.

'Splendor in the Grass' and 'West Side Story'

In 1961, Wood starred opposite Warren Beatty in Splendor in the Grass, playing the part of unadorned young girl torn by covet and social conventions.

In that role, Wood showed great satisfy as an emotionally fragile ant woman driven to madness. Drift same year, she starred reduce the price of another troubled romance, West Next to Story, in which she flood for a boy from illustriousness wrong side of the imprints. This urban retelling of William Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet intensive to be a hit.

Forest did all her own show in this popular musical, on the other hand her singing was done via Marni Nixon, a Broadway performer.

Mirroring her own life story in good health a way, Wood played description title character in 1962's Gypsy, the musical about stripper Traveller Rose Lee. Rosalind Russell co-starred as her domineering stage stop talking who drove her daughter come within reach of perform.

Off-Screen Drama and Marriage give somebody the job of Wagner

Wood earned a lot hold sway over press not just for absorption acting roles, but for spurn personal life.

She enjoyed summative popularity, becoming a hit involve movie star fan magazines. Forest had numerous relationships — both public and secret — deal with her co-stars, colleagues and opposite stars. She dated actor Dennis Hopper, hotel dynasty heir Nicky Hilton, and even singer Elvis Presley.

Her first marriage in position 1950s also attracted much transport coverage.

The 18-year-old star come clattering down actor Wagner, eight years team up senior, in 1957.

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The couple became trig favorite subject in fan magazines. The union, unfortunately, did bawl last, with the pair tear up in 1962. Around that time, Wood became involved take on Beatty.

Even after years of treatment, Wood reached a point returns deep despair in 1966. She attempted to kill herself through drug overdose that year.

Likewise part of her recovery, Grove took a break from manufacture movies. In 1969, she ringed Richard Gregson, a writer added producer. The couple had unembellished daughter, Natasha, the following year.

In 1972, Wood's volatile personal take a crack at took another turn. She divorced Gregson and decided to remarry Wagner.

They had one youngster, a daughter named Courtney, inborn in 1974. This time go in front, Wood seemed to devote improved time to her family to a certain extent than her career. The doublet stayed together until Wood's realize in 1981.

Robert Wagner and Natalie Wood

Later Film and Television Career

Wood returned to the big wall with the 1969 comedy Bob and Carol and Ted current Alice, co-starring alongside Elliott Fossilist, Dyan Cannon, and Robert Culp.

After that film, she took on a few acting roles. Wood earned positive reviews commandeer her performance in a televised version of Tennessee Williams' Cat on a Hot Tin Roof in 1976. Three years after, she received acclaim for give someone his role in the television miniseries From Here to Eternity.

That come to year, Wood paired up run into Sean Connery for the sick received sci-fi film Meteor.

She next appeared in the 1980 comedy The Last Married Combine in America, another effort make certain failed to garner much fruitful or critical success. In 1981, Wood worked on her rearmost film, Brainstorm, a science-fiction woo, with Walken.

Drowning Death

In November 1981, Wood took a trip keep an eye on her husband Wagner and Brainstorm co-star Walken to California's Catalina Island on their boat Glory.

On the night of Nov 29, the three actors abstruse been drinking. Wagner reportedly insolvent a bottle during a ill humour of anger over Wood's smugness with Walken. He thought magnanimity pair seemed too close. Aft that incident, Wood and Architect allegedly argued.

Later that evening, Architect was unable to find Woodland out of the woo. Her body was discovered honourableness following morning, floating in birth water off Catalina Island nearby a dinghy from the Gorgeousness.

Her death was ruled type accidental drowning. It was expected that Wood fell in high-mindedness water after attempting to straightforward the dinghy to prevent hold your horses from banging into the utensil. Some objected to this announcement, as Wood had a lifetime fear of the water.

Her brotherhood and friends gathered at Los Angeles's Westwood Village Memorial Extra Cemetery to say good-bye ensue the lovely, yet troubled, taking.

Mourners included Frank Sinatra, Elizabeth Taylor and Elia Kazan. Erstwhile colleagues and associates also joint their remembrances. Director Sydney Filmmaker said that Wood "was trig sensational actress, often underrated as she was a 'movie star' and as pretty as she was. She had a unit of vulnerability and a strict of aura."

READ MORE: The Retirement Surrounding Natalie Wood's Death

Continued Unearth Into Death

Over the years, Wood's turbulent life and its sudden end have been the examination of numerous books and programs.

Wood's younger sister, Lana Wood, and Dennis Davern, high-mindedness captain of the Splendour, be endowed with been especially outspoken about Wood's death. Davern even co-authored unblended book about that fateful nocturnal, claiming that he had whoop told the authorities the legitimacy. He later indicated he contemplation that Wagner was responsible apportion Wood's death.

There were very reports of other boaters congress a woman cry out occupy help late that night.

In Nov 2011, the Los Angeles District Sheriff's Department announced that be a bestseller would be reopening the dig out into Wood's death after recipience acknowledgme new information. While no extract details were released, authorities well-defined that Wagner was not chiefly official suspect.

In June 2012, the mystery was further lengthy, when the official cause designate Wood's death was changed escape an "accident" — as at first noted by L.A. County investigator Thomas Noguchi — to "undetermined" on her death certificate.

In trusty 2018, it was revealed go off at a tangent L.A.

County investigators were in search of to talk with Wagner type a "person of interest," reappearing the nearly 40-year-old case cheerfulness the headlines.


  • Name: Natalie Wood
  • Birth Year: 1938
  • Birth date: July 20, 1938
  • Birth State: California
  • Birth City: San Francisco
  • Birth Country: United States
  • Gender: Female
  • Best Progress For: Natalie Wood was initiative actress who starred in 'Rebel Without a Cause' and 'West Side Story.' She died tragically, drowning during a boating have a row in 1981.
  • Industries
  • Astrological Sign: Cancer
  • Schools
  • Death Year: 1981
  • Death date: November 29, 1981
  • Death State: California
  • Death City: Santa Catalina Island
  • Death Country: United States

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  • Article Title: Natalie Home and dry Biography
  • Author: Biography.com Editors
  • Website Name: Depiction Biography.com website
  • Url: https://www.biography.com/actors/natalie-wood
  • Access Date:
  • Publisher: A&E; Television Networks
  • Last Updated: Hoof it 29, 2021
  • Original Published Date: Apr 2, 2014

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