Natalie Wood

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Natalie Wood 1973
Signature of Natalie Wood

Natalie Wood (born: Natalia Nikolaevna Zakharenko ; born July 20, 1938 in San Francisco ; † November 29, 1981 off Santa Catalina Island ) was an American actress . It reached its greatest popularity in the 1950s and 1960s with films like ... Because They Don't Know What They're Doing and West Side Story, and was awarded three Golden Globe Awards , among others .

life and career

Natalie Wood was born in San Francisco in 1938 under the name Natalia Nikolaevna Zakharenko. Her parents came from Russia and immigrated to the USA . The working-class family lived under rather poor conditions and Natalie was encouraged to pursue a film career from her mother at an early age. At the age of four she got her first small role in the film Happy Land , directed by Irving Pichel , who is also considered to be her discoverer. Wood received her first significant role again in 1946 under Pichel's direction, when she played an Austrian orphan girl alongside Claudette Colbert and Orson Welles in Tomorrow is Eternity . This was followed by one of the leading roles for Wood in George Seaton's Christmas classic The Miracle of Manhattan , where she played the daughter of Maureen O'Hara . After that success, Wood became one of the most popular child stars in Hollywood. After that she played mainly in family films as the daughter of stars like James Stewart , Fred MacMurray and Bette Davis .

As early as the 1950s, Wood was seen on emerging television, for example in one of the leading roles in the family series The Pride of the Family (1953-1954). She later reported having been raped around that time, aged 16. She never revealed the name of the perpetrator, but her sister Lana said it was one of the biggest Hollywood stars of those years, which continues to lead to speculation today.

Wood made the transition from child star to teen idol when Judy rebelled against her parents in ... Because They Don't Know What They Do (1955) at the side of James Dean . She received an Oscar nomination for Best Supporting Actress and the Golden Globe Award for Best Young Actress for the role of Judy, because of which Wood had been eager to change her image . In 1956, Wood played a brief but important role in John Ford's western classic The Black Falcon . This was followed by two films with Tab Hunter and the lead role in the melodrama Marjorie Morningstar , where she played a young Jewish girl from New York. These roles made her not only a popular star, but also a serious actress in the late 1950s. She received another Oscar nomination for her appearance in Elia Kazan's drama Fever im Blut (1961) about the failure of a love in Puritan Kansas in the 1920s.

She had her greatest cinema success in 1961 with the role of Maria in the film adaptation of Leonard Bernstein's West Side Story . She could only be heard in the speaking scenes themselves. Her singing voice was that of Marni Nixon , who then replaced Audrey Hepburn's voice in the film musical My Fair Lady . The following year she played alongside Rosalind Russell in Gypsy , where Wood could also prove her singing talent. Directed by Robert Mulligan , Wood starred in the abortion drama In Love with a Stranger in 1964 , for which she received her third Oscar nomination at the age of 25, which was a record at the time. She also attracted attention in the following year through The Great Race Around the World (1965), where she played the leading female role alongside Tony Curtis , Jack Lemmon and Peter Falk . In private, Wood formed one of the dream couples of the 1950s and 1960s with the actor Robert Wagner , with whom she was initially married from 1957 to 1962. After her brief marriage to English producer and agent Richard Gregson and the birth of their daughter, actress Natasha Gregson Wagner , Wood and Robert Wagner remarried in 1972. They had a daughter, Courtney Wagner.

Professionally, Natalie Wood had already become quite quiet at the time, as she was now too old for her youthful roles and was devoting herself to her two children. In the 1970s, she appeared mainly in television films and made only a few cinema productions. In 1980 she was able to draw attention again when she won a Golden Globe Award for her leading role in the television miniseries From Here to Eternity . At the time of her death, she was working with Christopher Walken on the film Projekt Brainstorm , which came out in 1983.

Mysterious death

Natalie Woods grave in Westwood Memorial Park

While filming Brainstorm , Wood went on a yacht outing with husband Robert Wagner, fellow Brainstorm actor Christopher Walken and boat captain Dennis Davern in November 1981 . She disappeared from the boat near Santa Catalina Island on the night of November 28th to 29th . The circumstances of her death are still unclear and the subject of much speculation. On the morning of November 29, her body was found about a mile away, floating in the water. Natalie Wood found her final resting place in the Westwood Village Memorial Park Cemetery .

The dinghy of the boat was also near the body . The coroner Thomas Noguchi classified the case as an accidental death by drowning and hypothermia. Wood, who was very drunk at the time of her death, apparently tried to reach the country with the dinghy and drowned in the process. Her sister, the actress Lana Wood , expressed doubts about this theory, as the non-swimmer Wood had been afraid of water all her life, which is why, in her opinion, she would never have left the ship alone. Two people on a nearby boat said they heard female cries for help that night.

In 2011, the boat captain Davern expressed himself and contradicted his own earlier statements. According to Davern's new information, there was an argument between Wood and Wagner on the night of his death, and after their disappearance Wagner prevented him from turning on the search lights and calling the police. Davern holds Wagner responsible for Wood's death. The circumstances of death were then examined again in November 2011 without any concrete result. The death previously classified as an accident was reassessed in January 2013 and a new autopsy report was prepared. Accordingly, Wood's body had bruises and scratches on arms, legs and forehead, which she probably sustained before falling into the water. Her death is now attributed to "undetermined causes". According to the US police in 2018, her widower Wagner is now the focus of the investigation as a person of interest 'person of special (police) interest' . It is now known that Wagner was the last person at Wood's side before she died. Wagner said in his biography Pieces of My Heart , published in 2008 , that there had been an argument before Wood's death, but that her death was an accident.

Biography

In 2004 the American director Peter Bogdanovich filmed Wood's life story in the television film The Mystery of Natalie Wood with the South African actress Justine Waddell in the lead role. Wood's younger sister Lana was also involved in the film as a co-producer. Robert Wagner is played by Michael Weatherly , Warren Beatty by Matthew Settle .

In his film Once Upon a Time in Hollywood (2019), Quentin Tarantino alludes to the circumstances of Wood's death by giving a similar story to the character's late wife, Cliff Booth. There, too, there is repeated speculation about the truth, but the mystery is not resolved.

Awards

Natalie Woods star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame

Oscars

Golden Globe Awards

British Academy Film Award

Festival Internacional de Cine de Mar del Plata

  • 1964: Best Actress Award for In Love With A Stranger

Saturn Award

Hollywood Walk of Fame

  • 1986: Star in the film category

Filmography (selection)

Natalie Wood (1979), Photo: Jack Mitchell

Web links

Commons : Natalie Wood  - collection of pictures, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Katherine Rosman: A Mother's Death, a Daughter's Life: Remembering Natalie Wood , In: The New York Times , March 19, 2016. Retrieved September 10, 2019.
  2. ↑ Los Angeles Times Staff: How The Times covered Natalie Wood's mysterious death in 1981. Retrieved February 2, 2018 .
  3. ↑ Philip Sherwell: Natalie Wood was too 'terrified' of water to try to leave Robert Wagner on yacht by dinghy . November 19, 2011, ISSN  0307-1235 (English, telegraph.co.uk [accessed February 2, 2018]).
  4. ↑ Los Angeles Times Staff: How The Times covered Natalie Wood's mysterious death in 1981. Retrieved February 2, 2018 .
  5. ↑ Scott Stump, TODAY.com contributor: Boat captain alleges actor Robert Wagner responsible for Natalie Wood's death . In: TODAY.com . (English, today.com [accessed February 2, 2018]).
  6. ↑ Comeback of a mysterious death . Spiegel Online, November 18, 2011, accessed November 18, 2011.
  7. ^ Richard Winton: Detectives find no evidence of foul play in Natalie Wood's death . Los Angeles Times , January 10, 2012, accessed April 7, 2012.
  8. ^ New autopsy report: Mysterious Death of Natalie Wood . In: Spiegel Online . January 15, 2013 ( spiegel.de [accessed September 10, 2019]).
  9. ↑ Michael Remke: Natalie Woods death: scratches on the neck, smaller ones on the forehead . January 15, 2013 ( welt.de [accessed September 10, 2019]).
  10. ↑ Secret Hollywood - The Dark Side of the Dream Factory. ZDF documentary 2015
  11. ↑ Mysterious death of Natalie Wood: Robert Wagner moves into the sights of the police . In: stern.de . February 2, 2018 ( stern.de [accessed February 2, 2018]).
  12. ↑ DIE WELT: Natalie Wood: US police have new, old thesis on their death . In: THE WORLD . February 2, 2018 ( welt.de [accessed February 2, 2018]).
  13. ↑ Movie starts: Brad Pitt has apparently leaked the biggest secret of "Once Upon A Time In Hollywood"! Retrieved September 10, 2019 .
personal data
SURNAME Wood, Natalie
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Zakharenko, Natalia Nikolaevna (maiden name); Захаренко, Наталья Николаевна (Russian); Gurdin, Natasha; Sacharenko, Natalja Nikolajewna (Russian, transcribed)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION US-american actress
DATE OF BIRTH July 20, 1938
PLACE OF BIRTH San Francisco
DATE OF DEATH November 29, 1981
Place of death near Santa Catalina Island , California