Natalie Wood: A Hollywood Life Cut Short, in Pictures

A look at one of the last great Hollywood stars, whose 1981 death is still one of Hollywood's biggest mysteries

CHILD STAR

Everett

Natalie Wood was born on July 20, 1938, in San Francisco. She got her start at just 4 years old with a string of small film parts before truly launching her career with 1947's Miracle on 34th Street. Her trademark big brown eyes, flashing at Santa (Edmund Gwenn), were already evident.

MOVIE STAR

Everett

Groomed for stardom by her ambitious Russian mother Maria, Wood (born Natalia Nikolaevna Zakharenko) became a teen star with her Oscar-nominated turn in 1955's Rebel Without a Cause. Wood then received her second Oscar nod for 1961's Splendor in the Grass, costarring her off-screen lover, Warren Beatty (pictured).

MARRIED YOUNG

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Warner Bros. starlet Wood was 18 and had a crush on 26-year-old 20th Century Fox contract player Robert Wagner when she asked their mutual agent to set up a date in 1956. They married a year later, despite her mother's objections, but separated in 1961 and divorced in 1962.

BOX-OFFICE NAME

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West Side Story couldn't reach the screen without a star attached, so United Artists signed Wood, put on heavy makeup and dubbed her singing voice for the role of Puerto Rican immigrant Maria (seen here with Richard Beymer) in the landmark 1961 movie musical that won 10 Oscars, including Best Picture.

SECOND HUSBAND

Globe

Wood wed British producer Richard Gregson in 1969, and together they had a daughter, Natasha, in 1970. The couple split 11 months later, supposedly over his indiscretions with her assistant. They divorced in 1972 even though Wood's mother objected, arguing the actress should stay married for Natasha's sake.

BACK WITH BOB

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After her divorce from Gregson, Wood resumed her relationship with first husband "R.J." She and Wagner, here with their family in 1976, raised Natasha together, and their daughter, Courtney Wagner, was born in 1974.

CAREER JUMPER

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Despite occasional career stalls, Woods had a knack for revitalizing her star status, as happened with 1969's social comedy about marriage swapping, Bob & Carol & Ted & Alice — though, except for a cameo (as herself) in 1972's The Candidate, Bob & Carol was Wood's last movie of note.

FINAL ROLE

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Wood drowned on Nov. 29, 1981, on a break from shooting the sci-fi movie Brainstorm with Christopher Walken (shown here). The studio edited the film with the footage it already had in the can and released the finished product, to disappointing results, in 1983.

SPLENDOUR AT SEA

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Wagner and Wood's yacht, the Splendour (inset), was docked off Southern California's Catalina Island when Wood fled from it in the dark of night. The couple, plus Walken and captain Dennis Davern, were aboard. Her body was recovered and her death was classified as an accidental drowning; an autopsy said she was intoxicated at the time of her death, at age 43.

The case was reopened in 2011 and in 2018, the mystery surrounding Wood's death was again in the news as Los Angeles County Sheriff's investigators named Wagner "more of a person of interest."

Wagner has refused to speak with investigators since they began to look into the circumstances surrounding Wood's death again. There hasn't been momentum in the case since, though it was the subject of a 2020 documentary.