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Natalie Wood's Death
- Natalie Wood
- Actress
- July 20, 1938
- November 29, 1981
- Drowning
She was a child movie star who managed to stay current, moving on to roles as the troubled teenager and then the sexy grown-up. And she died in a most ironic way. Despite her lifelong fear of water and cautious approach when near it, she drowned.
Natalie was born Natalia Zacharenko in San Francisco and her first really big role was "Miracle on 34th Street", a holiday season hit in which she doesn't believe in Santa Claus.
As Natalie matured, she took on meatier roles in films like "Rebel Without a Cause" with James Dean and Sal Mineo.
Other troubled youth roles included Maria in "West Side Story" and Deanie Loomis in "Splendor in the Grass", opposite Warren Beatty.
As an adult, she moved on to Gypsy Rose Lee….
And her later film credits included "Bob and Carol and Ted and Alice", a sexual liberation comedy.
Married to Robert Wagner in 1957, they divorced in 1962. They then remarried in 1974 and had a daughter, Courtney
Natalie drowned after falling from "Splendor", the yacht she owned with Wagner.
There were immediate questions about it because Wagner and actor Christopher Walken, with whom Natalie was starring at the time in "Brainstorm", said there was an argument on-board beforehand.
Her death was originally ruled an accident, but as recently as 2012 it was reclassified from "accidental drowning" to "drowning and other unidentified factors".
Then, in 2018, police Wagner was named a person of interest in her death. Years after she died, the yacht captain, Dennis Davern, recanted his original statement and said he heard Natalie and her husband arguing the night she died. The captain claimed he wanted justice for her.
CBS-TV’s “48 Hours” reported that a person on a neighboring boat also said she heard the two arguing.
Police said Wagner’s account changed a little bit and didn’t add up.
But there were no arrests and Wagner and Walken both refused to be interviewed for the “48 Hours” segment.
To be continued…