All language subtitles for Natalie.Wood.What.Remains.Behind.2020.WEBRip.x264-ION10_Eng

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I remember it was Sunday morning after
Thanksgiving. �I was 11 years old,

and I had spent the night at
my best friend Tracy's house.

The clock radio went off and woke
me up, and I heard a news report say

my mom's body was found
off the coast of Catalina.

The next thing I knew, my stepdad's driver
was there with our nanny, Willie Mae.

They had come to pick me up
and take me home.

It had rained, and the streets were
wet, and I was asking, "Is Mommy okay?"

But they were just comforting me, and they
weren't really telling me what happened.

When I got home, I got into my mom's
bed and tried to comfort myself.

I said, "Maybe she just has a
broken leg or something like that."

Then my stepdad came back. �I went
down the steps, and I could tell,

just when I looked at his face,
that something awful had happened.

The day my mom died,
my entire world was shattered,

and our family
has never been the same.

Since then, there's been so much
speculation and focus on how she died

that it's overshadowed her life's
work and who she was as a person.

I'm Natasha Gregson Wagner,
and my mom was Natalie Wood.

Hello, Natalie. -Oh, hello again. �Please
sit down. -Thank you. �How's the food?

Best location food I ever ate.
�Well, I must say, you certainly seem

to thrive on it. �Well, I was brought up
on it. �I've been eating lunch on the set

since I was four years old. �That's
correct. Natalie's a movie veteran.

Been in pictures since 1941.
Is that correct? �That's right.

My original real name was
Natalia Nikolaevna Zakharenko.

Zakharenko was always being mispronounced.
�It was very difficult, so my parents

changed their name to Gurdin, and
then that got mispronounced a lot,

so when I was five years old and
William Goetz put me into my first film,

he that that Gurdin
was not a good name,

and at this point,
I was being called Natasha,

which is really a nickname for Natalia, so
he chose Natalie, and then he chose Wood

in honor of his friend Sam Wood, the
director. �So that's how I got named.

Oh, daisies on your coffeepot! �They're
my favorite flower. �With Natalie Wood,

one of the most fascinating
things about her is,

generations of people watched her
grow up, and so it was congruent

with what was happening
with their own development.

No, Mom.
We haven't gone too far.

When you're an adolescent,
you're a very different person

than you were when you were
five years old,

and she certainly was that but on
steroids, 'cause she was a movie star.

Wish me luck! �I'm gonna
make a noise in the world!

The business she was in is a tough
business, and to survive in that business,

you had to have a tough side to you,
and so I think she had to develop that.

But it wasn't comfortable.

What she really wanted to do was to laugh
and have fun and just be a regular person.

But mainly, she had a big heart,
and that showed up in her work.

You can't pinpoint what it is
that draws you to a character.

You just suddenly say, "I know her.
�I know that I can make her be real."

People knew she was smart
and incredibly well-organized,

and in a town where women
were not always respected,

not in their work and not
socially, she was an exception.

She knew how it should be lit,
she knew how the sound should be,

she knew how she should look, and she
sure knew how to give a great performance.

I know this may come as a great
big shock to the both of you,

but underneath all this hair
and skin is a human girl

with all the regular things going
for me, and believe it or not,

I don't want to spend
the rest of my life

married to a man
who's doing me a big favor!

Primarily, I'm an actress, and I think
that at the point when you're a star,

mainly, I was thinking of the work,
not of the stardom that follows it.

I've enjoyed the part
where you act,

where the red light goes on and the camera
rolls and you really can do your work,

and in the film business,
there are so many other things

that enter into making it
possible for those moments

where you just are able
to do your craft

without the interference
of a lot of other things.

I always knew that she was an actor,
but, you know, around the house,

my mom didn't wear a lot of
makeup, and she was very casual,

so I would look at her and think, "What
is-what's the big deal about you, lady?"

But then she and my stepdad
would get dressed up,

and they would go out to dinner or
something, and she was amazing-looking.

But we weren't raised by someone
who seemed like a movie star at all.

All she just seemed was sort of larger
than life but not because she was famous,

more because she was just her.

I was seven when she passed away,
and I feel like my memories of her

are just ever-evolving. �You
know, there's her beautiful face

and her voice and her hands and
all those things that I remember.

But when I try to think of my mom now,
it's so hard; like, I will literally

come across a picture,
and I'll just look at it,

and I'll look at it a little bit more,
thinking, "Is that really my mom?

How is it that she's my mom?"
�I just have this famous mother,

and she's like this mythology
character. �I- you know.

I hope one day, I'll get to a place where
I can really access the true feeling

that this was my mother, that I
came from her and that she was mine

for a short time, you
know? �Like, I feel like

it's just been very hard
to hold on to that.

I have two fathers. �My biological
father is Richard Gregson.

I call him Daddy Gregson. �My stepfather
is Robert Wagner, who everyone calls RJ,

and I call him Daddy Wagner. �My mom
was the one that started calling them

Daddy Gregson and Daddy Wagner to clarify
who was who in case people got confused.

And then it's just
nicknames that have stuck.

From the age of two, I was
primarily raised by my Daddy Wagner,

and in all that time, he
treated me like his own blood.

So, Dad, I just want to say

that I'm really excited to talk to
you about my mom... �Yes, I am too.

And everything we've been
through, the highs and the lows,

how we've always stayed connected through
all of it. �I don't think there's a day

that has ever gone by in my life
that there hasn't been a moment

that I haven't thought about
Natalie and how much she meant to me

in my heart and in my soul. �We started so
young. �To see her evolve over the years

into the woman that she
was was very special.

How did you two meet?
I want to hear both versions.

Well, actually, when I was ten years
old and RJ was about 18, I guess,

when you were first
under contract,

I remember walking down
the hallway with my mother,

and I saw him,
and I said to my mother,

"When I grow up, I wish that I could marry
him." �Did you really? -I really did.

Did you really know that she...
�Well, I didn't know it then.

It sure could've saved me a
lot of trouble, I'll tell you.

Could I ask for your version of when you
met? �When I came into Natalie's life,

I was sort of
a Happy Jack Squirrel kid,

you know, with nothing on my
mind much but my hair and...

She sort of resisted me a bit, actually,
at the beginning, because- -I did?

I was-yeah, well,
I was so different

than all the rest of the-
-I don't remember that.

Well, yes, you did,
and then I finally started

taking you-I remember
I took you out on-

On my 18th birthday, mm-hmm. -On your 18th
birthday. �I took her out on her birthday,

July 20, 1956. �I had done a picture

with Spencer Tracy
called "The Mountain",

and we went to the premiere,
and that sort of started it.

Everybody knew about Robert Wagner,
and my dad had introduced me to RJ

when I was maybe nine when
he did "Prince Valiant",

which was, at the time, my favorite
movie, and there he was, Prince Valiant.

There was nobody handsomer.
�And he was so kind to me.

On December 6, 1957, I made a reservation
at a restaurant in Beverly Hills

called Romanoff's. �Man,
I got Natalie down there,

and I opened a bottle of
champagne. �We had some champagne,

and I suddenly looked in my
glass, and there was a ring in it,

and I took the ring out
and looked,

and he said, "Look, guys",
and, "My God, what is this?"

Then he said, "Look on the
inside", and it said, "Marry me."

We got married in Scottsdale, Arizona,
and I got a private railroad car.

After the ceremony,
we went to the private car,

and a big train came by and picked
us up, and off we went to Chicago.

It was pretty exciting.

Maybe we should stay too.
�Well, I think you ought to go.

I really think you ought to. �Maybe
she'll be better by the morning. �Here.

Will you come back to the apartment?
�Yeah, yeah. It's 695 Park Avenue.

Yeah, I'll come back. �I loved
working with RJ and Natalie.

There was something about her
that was incredibly ingratiating.

She made you feel important,
not her.

Something that's one of the
tricks of life and success

is to make other people
feel important

when they're around you, not
because you are an important person.

While here, still enjoying the plaudits
for his "In Love and War" role,

is Robert Wagner with his
lovely wife, Natalie Wood.

The studios were always anxious to
get publicity, and at that time,

the movie magazines were the
thing- "Photoplay", "Modern Screen"-

and Natalie and I were one of
the hot things for the magazines,

so they were very much
involved in our relationship.

Nat and RJ
were both major stars,

and I didn't feel like one
was outshining the other.

There's a sort of royalty
to that business,

and RJ and Nat
were that royalty.

So why don't we start by you telling
me how you and my mom met? �Oh, okay.

Let's see. How did we meet? �Well,
I met your mother and Daddy Wagner

the same day, the same moment, because I
was working for the director Elia Kazan,

and I was a production assistant
on "Splendor in the Grass."

There, I had to go and get
your mother every morning.

Therefore, we talked an awful
lot, and it was clear to me

that there was trouble
in their marriage. �Mm.

I discovered that my mom had written an
article for "Ladies' Home Journal" in 1966

that was never published. �It was called
"Public Property, Private Person."

It was amazing
to read this article.

I found out so many things about
my mom's life that I didn't know,

especially during a really
challenging time for her.

"After two years of marriage,
"things began to change.

"We were aware that we had problems, "but
we tried to avoid the real conflicts.

"We maintained a superficially
happy relationship

"and hoped that by pretending
there was nothing wrong,

"the problems would go away. "How do
you separate reality from illusion

"when you have been trapped
in make-believe all your life?

"Marriage requires patience
and work,

"as well as the capacity
to accept another human being,

"flaws and all, without cloaking him
in a smothering mantle of perfection."

With the pressure of being
this wonderful couple

and the marriage starting
to have difficulties in it,

I could feel it unraveling, and
so could she, and that time,

her career really started to catch on
fire. �It was like striking a match.

And when she did "Splendor" with Kazan, I
mean, this was a dream come true for her.

"Though nothing can bring back the
hour "of splendor in the grass,

"glory in the flower,
"we will grieve not,

"rather find the strength

in what remains behind." �And
on that picture, she knew

that she was not Kazan's first
choice, and she was out to prove

that she was a serious
actress. �Miss Metcalf,

may I please be e-

The opportunity to work with
Kazan was just fantastic,

but it was emotionally a very
demanding role, and it-I don't know.

It had quite an effect
on my life, I think.

"As RJ and I struggled
to make our marriage work,

"the problems
continued to pile up.

"After finishing work
on 'Splendor in the Grass, '

"I went directly
into 'West Side Story'

"for another solid
and rigorous eight months.

"The rest of the cast
had been rehearsing together

"for a month
while I finished 'Splendor.'

"Now I had to cram four weeks
of rehearsals "into weekends.

"I was worn out, "and I didn't have time
to be the kind of wife "I wanted to be.

"During this hectic period,
"RJ went through an ordeal

"that all performers, including
myself, "have to face.

"His career hit a momentary lull.
"Sometimes I waited for him to complain

"or start a fight, "but his
calm exterior remained intact.

His coolness
drove me frantic."

My career was not igniting like hers was,
but that wasn't really a very big factor

in the fact that we separated
and then finally divorced.

It was the pressure on her and her
career that caused that, and also,

I think that I might have been able
to handle it a little bit better.

If I'd have been a little bit
older and had more experience,

I might have been able to have worked
it out. �Any rumors that you've heard-

I mean, I'm here to say that
Warren Beatty, who was her costar

in "Splendor in the Grass",
was not the problem at all,

and there definitely did not
develop a relationship between them

until long after "Splendor" had wrapped.
�We were separated, and Warren, I think,

was very much taken by her,
and why wouldn't he be?

But that was a very difficult
time because I was so upset

and so disturbed by everything,
I was ready to go after him.

I can talk about that
pretty easily now,

but at the time, it was a little
bit difficult, as you can imagine.

The relationship between her
and Warren Beatty was hot.

You could almost not look at them.
�Your eyes were gonna burn out.

They were so good-looking. �I was
alone, I didn't have anybody in my life,

and I just couldn't stay in Los
Angeles anymore and be alone,

and I made a decision to move
to Europe. �So I talked to her,

and I said I was going to Europe. "Do
you feel like you'd want to come there?"

And she said,
"No, I have other plans",

and I said, "Okay",
and I hung up the phone,

and that was it. "Neither Warren nor I
was ready "for a permanent relationship,

"although our romance lasted
approximately two years.

"Our affair was a collision
from start to finish.

"While RJ never did express
hostility, "Warren couldn't stop,

"and I contributed my share of fireworks
too. "In fact, we were both so confused

"that we thought fighting and hostility
meant real emotional honesty."

After her relationship
with Warren had broken up,

my mom had a string of
relationships, and during the '60s,

before she married my Daddy Gregson,
she had a couple of broken engagements,

one with Arthur Loew Jr., who
remained a very close friend of hers,

another with Ladislav Blatnik, who was
known as the shoe king of Venezuela,

but I think that my mom was longing
to be taken care of emotionally,

and I think that's what she was
looking for during that time.

I was flattered
that I was, I think,

the only one she ever dated
who was younger than she,

and I was four years younger than she
was. �Didn't bother me. Didn't bother her.

But it was never gonna go anywhere.
�It was never supposed to go anywhere.

It was fun
for as long as it lasted,

and it-the friendship lasted
way beyond the dating period.

"For the first time in my
life, "I considered, in horror,

"the possibility that I might join
"that sad parade of famous movie ladies

"who wind up desperately lonely "with
nothing more substantial to sustain them

"than their scrapbooks and old photos
"and memories of romances and divorces.

"My ex-husband's first child had just
been born. "I cried when I heard the news.

"It wasn't only from the sense of loss
I felt "for something we never shared.

It was also happiness for him."
�My mom's name was Marion Marshall

when she was
in the picture business,

Marion Donen when she was married to
Stanley Donen, and she had two boys,

my brothers Josh Donen and Peter Donen,
who are eight and ten years older than me.

I left Los Angeles and lived in Rome
for three years, and I saw Marion,

and Marion and I started going out,
traveling all over Europe together,

and fell in love
with each other

and got married and came back
to the United States.

She had two sons, Peter and
Josh. �I loved these two boys,

and we had a wonderful life together, and
I had a daughter with her called Katie,

and that was a joy in my life.

Here we are in Wales at my
father Richard Gregson's house.

My dad has Parkinson's
at this point in his life,

and this might be one of the last
times we get to speak about my mom.

I was with her
the night she met your father.

They started seeing each other,
dating, and it got serious.

Richard Gregson was my agent, and then
he became a producer from being my agent,

and right from the beginning, I saw
him as a very, very smart, elegant guy

and very, very sophisticated,

more so than any of the agents
that I knew in Hollywood.

And I was best man at their wedding.
�I remember a story with him saying

that he asked all his wives to
marry him but they turned him down,

so he then had to wait for them to ask
him. �And eventually, Natalie asked him

to marry him, and they'd been together
for three or four years at that time.

And they had a big, big, fancy wedding
at a Russian church, Russian ceremony,

and it was beautiful.

How long have you been married
now? �Five months. -Five months.

Five months. And they said it
wouldn't last. �Don't say that!

And you've been quoted as saying
you wouldn't now take a film

that was thousands of miles apart? �Not
if it meant being away from Richard,

no, I wouldn't. �How long have you
been married, Robert? 11 years.

And what advice would you give this young
couple? �Yes, Redford, tell us what to do.

Well, just try to keep track of
how many years you're married

and, you know, remember
the dates when they come up.

That's right, 'cause somebody
asked you last week,

and they said, "What day were you married
on?" and simultaneously, I said May 30th,

and he said May 31st. �You don't need
to ask who was wrong, right? �Yeah.

There's nothing quite like finding
out for the very first time

that you're gonna be pregnant and
to go through that first pregnancy.

There's just nothing ever
quite as miraculous as that.

Ah. -She didn't "get pregnant." �She
got pregnant because she wanted a baby,

so she was doing what she wanted and
doing it well, and then the work,

she put it aside for a while.
�She knew she'd get back to it.

There was nothing
more important to Natalie

than being a mom;
that was really clear.

I once walked in,
and she was coddling you,

and she just looked up at me
and said,

"Who needs show business
when one has this?"

My God, you were
the spitting image of her,

you know, when you were born
and a child. �It was incredible.

Before Natasha was born, she would
do a great deal of things with us.

We'd go out, we'd go to
SeaWorld, we'd go to Disneyland,

but then
when Natasha was born,

her sole focus, really,
I would say, was on Natasha.

Richard felt that Natalie was so involved
and emotionally connected to Natasha

that there wasn't any room for him,
so he did something really stupid

and got thrown out. �What happened
when you and Mommy got divorced?

Changed the locks, I think.

I love the story about how
you and Mommy reconnected

at your friend John Foreman's party.
�We saw each other at this party,

and so the sparks sort of flew a little
bit, and then I offered to drive her home,

and I did drive her home and dropped her
off and said good night to her, and...

And then she got into her house
on Bentley and started to cry,

and then what did you do? �I drove
down the street, and I stopped,

and I had tears in my eyes as
well. �Because you guys realized

that you still missed each other. �How
come you got married to Bob Wagner again?

Again?
-I mean, and how does it feel

when you marry your husband
after you divorced him?

And if you don't want to talk about
it, we'll pass. �Oh, it feels terrific.

I don't mind talking about it. -Okay.
�I was just fortunate, you know?

Timing was on our side. �We happened to
meet at a time when we were both free.

The fact that we both had feelings toward
the other one we didn't keep to ourselves.

I mean, we managed to convey that.
�Because I really had no idea that RJ

felt something still toward me,
even though I knew that I did,

and he felt the same way
and didn't know if I did.

But luckily, we didn't
keep that to ourselves.

I came into Natalie's life
through RJ.

RJ married my mother, and when
RJ and my mother divorced,

I remained very close to RJ, so when
he started seeing Natalie again,

naturally, that's how I was introduced
to Natalie, and after college,

Natalie said, "Come and live in our guest
house", and I stayed there for years,

and that's when we became
really close.

You know, and it was clear,
seeing them together,

that they loved each other,
but it was more.

It seemed to me that they should
be together. �This seemed right.

When you and Mommy got back together,
she was a mom and you were a dad.

That's right. -And you guys
had had ten years between.

So had you both really grown up? �I think
so. �You know, when we were younger,

we were very interested in our
careers and where we could go with it,

and that became less important the second
time. �I mean, it had more to do with us

and you and Katie. �It was pretty
exciting to be a part of that

relationship
and that love affair.

And then they got married the second
time around on the "Ramblin' Rose",

and it was just an incredible day.
�It was a small group of people,

probably about 30 people.

We got married in Paradise Cove,
and then we went from Paradise Cove

over to the Isthmus, and we
spent our honeymoon in Catalina.

Clearly, RJ was the love of her life,
because when they got back together,

it was like just two parts of the
same whole coming together again,

and I saw her in a more complete way.
�You know, she was totally happy.

Natalie, you tried natural
childbirth with your second child.

Well, with my first child, I did
have- �You tried it? -I was awake,

and I watched Natasha being born.
�Mm-hmm. -And with Courtney,

suddenly, there were complications, you
know, after about 17 or 18 hours of labor,

and all of a sudden,
the doctor said,

"Oh, no, this is gonna be
an emergency section",

and he got Courtney out in
two minutes, saved her life.

I was born March 9, 1974,
and I think there was a big-

like, a whole thing in the paper saying
that, like, I was near death and-

but I was the lovechild.

I had had Katie with Marion, and
she had had Natasha with Richard,

and we had Courtney together,
so we were-we were thrilled.

Do you know something more
the second time around?

I know to appreciate him for what- �Oh,
you're taking the blame, huh?

You didn't appreciate him first time
around? �No, no, no. Not necessarily.

I think we both appreciate
each other more,

and I think we know
each other better as people,

and we're kind of on the same wavelength.
�You know, we like to do the same things,

and we like hanging out together.
�We like hanging out with the kids.

When we got married, we were living in the
Springs. �I had this home in Palm Springs.

And then we found this house on
Cañon Drive in Beverly Hills,

and then we bought that
and moved into there.

When we were all very much a family in the
'70s, it was you, Mommy, Courtney, and I,

and Katie came and lived with
us, and that was our group

with visits from Josh and Peter,
Sarah, Charlotte, and Hugo.

The guest house was rather filled, wasn't
it? �Yeah, it was always turning over,

and many, many dogs, many cats, many
birds, many- �Lizards. -Lizards. �Ducks.

We had this amazing nanny named Willie Mae
who lived with us until she passed away

at the age of 90. �Great lady. �I
was really attached to Willie Mae.

I was always much more attached to
Willie Mae, really, than my mom.

I felt that Natasha had my
mom and I had Willie Mae.

And then, you know,
we had each other,

but I just-I don't know
what it was about Willie Mae.

I just loved Willie Mae so much. �Willie
Mae Worthen was the nanny, who I adored.

Everybody adored her. �She was this
six-foot giant from down South,

very brusque but loving.
�She was part of the family.

And I was Natalie Wood's personal
assistant for four years.

My office was literally in the
corner of the master bedroom.

These two were in bed. �It was
quite- it was quite funny, actually,

to be in that situation,
having come from an office.

And Natalie would give incredible
parties, but the main one each year

would be the New Year's Eve
party. �The guests would come.

There would be
George Segal and his wife.

There would be Gregory Peck,
Jimmy Stewart, Roddy McDowall.

I look to my right, and
there I saw, I swear to God,

Fred Astaire singing Cole Porter
with a pianist accompanying him,

and he finished his song, and
everybody burst into applause.

Those parties were the best.
�You'd be talking to someone

and turn around, and, ooh,
Sir Laurence Olivier.

Now I have to figure out what kind
of conversation �I can have with him.

And the house was just so
full of love and happiness,

it made you feel good to be there.
�So many people coming and going

in the Cañon Drive house that were not
only famous but just friends, you know,

really, really great friends.
�They had parties all the time.

You know,
our holidays were huge.

Courtney got as many presents
at Natasha's birthday

as Natasha got
at Courtney's birthday.

Everything was heaven. �The house
was so beautiful and also welcoming,

and Natalie was so candid, and the focus
was the children, not the grown-ups.

I remember the parties.
I remember the laughter.

I remember they were so in love with
each other, and my mom would always say,

"Oh, RJ, honestly!" but then she
would, like, break out laughing.

They were just always laughing.
�That connection that they had

is what I remember growing up. �And they
were always buying each other presents,

and my mom was always concocting
some kind of an incredible surprise

for my dad
that she would tell us about.

The most important thing for me is
my family and my husband, my kids.

That's why we like spending
a lot of time on the boat,

where we really are
just a family

and there aren't a lot
of other things to relate to.

We got a boat together, the
"Splendour", and we spent most weekends

and most vacations in Catalina. �We
spent a lot of time on that island.

Natalie never cooked at home, but she
would always cook breakfast on the boat,

and it was huevos rancheros,
and she enjoyed the boat.

You know, she'd have
the hat on and the outfit.

It was fun for the family, and it was fun
for RJ and Natalie to get away as well.

My parents were very relaxed
on the boat.

They'd bring other friends,
or we'd bring our friends.

We'd go to Catalina. We'd go to
Emerald Bay. �We'd go to the Isthmus.

And it was a really happy time
for us there.

As we reported earlier, actress
Natalie Wood was found dead today.

Her body was discovered fully clothed
in waters off Santa Catalina Island.

Los Angeles County officials can only
confirm the 43-year-old Ms. Wood drowned,

but nothing further on the
circumstances. �David Burrington reports.

Natalie Wood and her husband, actor Robert
Wagner, had sailed to Catalina Island

to spend the holiday weekend
with friends.

Apparently, they had returned to their
yacht, the "Splendour", after dinner,

when Natalie went back out on
the water in this rubber boat.

Exactly what happened then,
nobody knows,

but her body was found
after dawn this morning

in a small cove not far from the
rubber boat. �It was on the news,

and I called our mutual friend
Leonard Gershe,

and I said, "Is Natalie all right?"
�And he said, "No. Nat's..."

Natalie was gone. �I remember
being devastated by that news

and, having such affection
for her, hurt by the news.

The phone rang, and I
pick up the phone...

And RJ screams into the phone...

"She's gone!" �My brother Peter
Donen called me-my late brother-

called me about 6:00 in the morning,
and he-I picked up my phone in my room,

and he said, "Natalie's dead.
She drowned."

And I thought to myself, "Well, she
drowned, but she'll be back, right?"

I mean, that weird thing that you think
when you hear something like that.

I was walking along the beach, and it was
early in the morning, and I saw my brother

came out onto the beach, and he came
over to me; he put his arms around me.

He said, "Natalie's died." �And
I was just in a state of shock.

That was one of the worst mornings
that we've ever experienced.

So we got in the car
and went over to Cañon,

and already, there was press out in
the street and cameras and all of that,

and we were there before RJ was
there. �Eventually, RJ came home,

and we went downstairs, and
he came in looking like death.

I remember Willie Mae
woke me up,

and I could hear my sister Natasha
crying, and I saw all of these people

in the living room, and I
was walking down the steps,

and my dad was at the edge
of the steps,

and he said to me, "You know, you're
not gonna see your mom anymore."

He said, "But I want you to know
"that we're going to be all right.

"We're staying together, "we're still a
family, and we're gonna get through this."

It was heavy-duty stuff,
and he just clung on to them

and they on him. �It's like, the
instant that my mom passed away

is like the air in the balloon that was
our life, you know, it just-it just-

you know, it just-
the party was over.

I remember hearing that my grandma
fainted, but I remember that I didn't want

to be around my grandma
because she was too hysterical.

I think I was more
of a private griever,

and my grandma
was so kind of colorful

with her grief, so I didn't
feel safe around her.

I remember my grandmother
being really-

I mean, talk about someone
that was checked out.

I mean, she would just faint, you
know. �She was very dramatic too.

I mean, there would be times
where you would hear

that, like, she suddenly just got
frightened and she ran into a wall

because she wasn't
paying attention.

I mean, she was just- you know, this
was a woman that was grief-stricken

and whose whole life
revolved around her daughter.

My mom's parents, my grandparents,
were Nick and Maria Gurdin.

They spoke with these thick Russian
accents because they were both immigrants

who met and married in San Francisco.
�My mom called her parents Mud and Fad,

short for Mudda and Fadda. �My mom
was the middle child of three girls.

She had an older half sister named
Olga who was ten years older than her

and a younger sister, Lana,
who was eight years younger.

My parents moved from San Francisco to
Santa Rosa when I was about two, I think,

and then a movie company
came to Santa Rosa

on location, and they needed a little
girl to drop an ice cream cone and cry,

and I think my mama gave me a little
nudge in the right direction and said,

"Why don't you go talk to that nice man,
sing him some of your songs?" �And...

So I did, and he chose me
to drop the ice cream cone,

and then he remembered me a year later
when he was doing "Tomorrow is Forever."

His name was Irving Pichel, and
he wrote to my parents and said

that he would like to have me come
to Los Angeles and do a screen test

because he had a part
for a young German girl,

and against my father's deeper wishes,
my mother and I traveled down by train,

and I made the screen test,
got the part,

and it seemed a good idea
to move down to Los Angeles,

which we then did,
and my father began working

in the miniature prop
department at the studios,

so we would sometimes bump into
each other. �We were both working.

Shall we go away soon, Father?

Go? �You said maybe we would leave
here. �I was her first leading man,

and for six or seven takes, I kept
blowing my lines. �Not Natalie.

I think it was her first picture, but
she was already a perfect little pro.

Well, young lady, what's your
name? �Susan Walker. What's yours?

Mine? Kriss Kringle. �I'm Santa Claus.

Oh, you don't believe that, do you?
�Mm-mm. �You see, my mother's Mrs. Walker,

the lady who hired you.
-Oh. �But I must say,

you're the best-looking one I've ever
seen. �Really? -Your beard doesn't have

one of those things that goes over your
ears. �Well, that's because it's real,

just like I'm
really Santa Claus.

What stands out about
Natalie Wood's performance

in "Miracle on 34th Street"
is, there's no artifice.

She's so watchful and skeptical and
very sure-seeming in who she was,

and then in the end, she had the same
dreams and fantasies as everybody else,

and I think that's what was
so appealing about it.

"The reality of Hollywood
was a dash of cold water.

"Instead of glamour, I found
myself immersed "in work and study.

"By the time I was 12, "my father suffered
the first of a series of heart attacks.

"For a few years,
he couldn't work at all.

"This meant my acting was the sole
economic support "of my family,

"and therefore, getting jobs
"became a tremendous responsibility.

"Sometimes I had nightmares about
the family starving if I didn't act."

The story I remember �Natalie
telling me about her mother

was an audition she went to, and her
mother felt it hadn't gone terribly well,

and on the way out of the
studio, she said to Natalie,

"Well, that wasn't very good, was
it? �No new shoes for your sister."

Of course, Natalie was called back
and did get the role, so presumably,

Lana did get her new shoes.

But there was a lot of
pressure on young Natalie.

When she did a film called "The Green
Promise", she injured her wrist...

And it never healed properly,
and so her wrist bone was bigger

on one wrist than the other, and
she felt self-conscious about it,

so she always wore a bracelet to cover it
up. �She had a bracelet she always wore,

and it covered up a thing on her wrist,
and it always kind of made me think,

"This is a woman in total control but
had a flaw that she was aware of."

Didn't mean anything,
but in a way,

it made me feel a connection
with her vulnerability

and this childhood stardom that she had
had that she was childhood star, huge.

Don't you know that children
should be seen and not heard?

Not according to Jeremiah.
"Say not I am a child,

"for thou shalt go
to all that I shalt send thee,

and whatsoever I command thee,
thou shalt speak."

Steven, will you take her away from here?
�Did you not feel that you were missing

a lot of the fun
of being a child?

Well, I wasn't aware of it at the time,
you know? �I mean, I guess I wasn't aware

that other kids did other things.
�And then when I was about 12,

I started going to a regular
school in between jobs,

and I did feel a bit of a
misfit then during that period,

because I was so comfortable with adults
and rather uncomfortable with kids,

having not been around
very many.

I met Natalie Wood in junior high.
�She was very nice, very pleasant.

She wasn't, "Ha, look at me. I'm a movie
star", not with anyone in the school,

and they didn't treat her like she
was. �But we became fast friends,

and her mother was very protective of who
she chatted with, who she went out with,

and I passed her mother's
test. �So that was good.

Natalie's parents were very involved with
her. �They knew everything that she did

and where she went and what she wore, and
they were helicopter parents, you know?

They were always hovering
around her all the time.

Natalie's father, Nick, he was
very quiet. �When I met him,

I think he had developed a heart problem,
and he generally was a quiet, gentle man,

that I knew. �Didn't have a lot of
dialogue with him, but with Maria, I did.

She was a strange lady. �She would say,
"Don't walk on that side of the road

"when the sun is shining,
because you'll be struck down."

And lots of little fears. �My
grandma was incredibly superstitious,

so she filled my mom's head
with all kinds of crazy stories.

I've always been terrified-
still am-of water,

dark water, seawater
or, you know, river water.

There's this story
that a gypsy told my grandma

that her second daughter
would become world-famous...

Oh! �But to beware of dark water.

Can you swim? �A little! �All right,
cut. �People are fixated on the fact

that my mom was afraid of dark water,
I think, simply because she drowned.

But, you know, as a child, she was in the
pool with us all the time, and she and I

never talked about her fear of dark water,
so it never felt like this big thing.

I mean, who likes dark water?
�It's not very enticing.

But my grandma was so fantastical. �She
was so twirling and swirling with stories

that I don't know what was real and what
wasn't. �I remember Natalie was in bed,

studying her script, and Maria
was in one of the second bedrooms,

and all of a sudden, she started
to tremble, and her eyes rolled up,

and I dashed
back into the room to Natalie.

I put her on the bed, and I said,
"Natalie, "your mother, she's ill.

I think she's having an epileptic
fit." �And so Natalie said...

"She'll be all right in a
minute." �Never blinked an eye.

And it was from then I learned

that this was a regular habit
of Maria's to get attention.

My mom's very complicated relationship
with my grandma and being a daughter

of a narcissistic,
controlling, possessive mother-

I mean, that's played out
in so many of her films.

On "Gypsy", your mother actually said
to me, "I don't know how I'm gonna play

this last scene", and I just nearly
fell on the floor, and I said,

"What?" "You don't know
how to play that scene?

"I mean, just look at Rosalind Russell
in the eye "and pretend it's your mother,

"it's Maria Gurdin, and you got it."
�Mama, look at me now! I'm a star!

Look! Look how I live! �Look at
my friends. Look where I'm going.

I'm not staying in burlesque.
�I'm moving, maybe up, maybe down,

but wherever it is, I'm enjoying
it. �I'm having the time of my life

because for the first time, it is my life,
and I love it. �I love every second of it,

and I'll be damned if you're gonna
take it away from me! �Her mother was

like a lot of mothers of successful
people. �She was determined

that her daughter was going to be
successful, I think, and Natalie was.

I think she once told me
that she didn't really decide

that that was what she wanted
to do was be an actress

until Nick Ray and "Rebel",
and then it was clear to her

that she was not just being pushed
by her mother any longer. -Mm-hmm.

He looks at me like �I was the
ugliest thing in the world.

He doesn't like my friends. �He
doesn't like one thing about me.

And he called me...

he called me a dirty
tramp! �My own father!

It was a very important film
for me personally

because up until then,
I had worked as a child,

and I had always just done
as I was told.

I was-you know, "You do this picture
next, and then you do that picture next",

and I was
a rather dutiful child.

And when my parents read
the script of "Rebel",

they said, "Oh, no, not this one",
'cause this, you know, showed parents

in a rather unsympathetic
light,

and yet I read it, and for the first time
in my life, I said, "Oh, wait a minute.

I have to do this. I love this."
�You know, I love Judy, and I felt

very much of a connection,
identification with the part,

and I guess I was going
through my first rebellion.

My mom wanted to make
"Rebel Without a Cause"

because she knew
that it was gonna take her

away from these sort of good little
girl roles into leading lady roles,

and so she fought really hard to get
that part. �When I was 15 years old

and doing "Rebel Without
a Cause", at that time,

the director and the studios and
so forth said I was too young,

even though I was exactly the right age.
�They were sort of testing older girls,

and they also saw me
in pigtails with a pinafore,

because those were the kind of parts that
I was associated with. �So I tested for it

a number of times, as a matter of
fact. �Well, it's all right now.

You're our baby now. �I think
I also got into a car accident,

and instead of telling them to call my
parents, I told them to call the director

because one of the policemen
called me a juvenile delinquent,

and I said, "Oh, well, then that
must mean that I have the part."

"Call Nick Ray." �There's
sort of a famous story

where she went to the Chateau Marmont
to get together with Nicholas Ray,

the director
of "Rebel Without a Cause",

and something intimate went on with the
two of them, a risky business back then.

She was underage, and he was older, right,
so that would've been a problem today.

I met Nicholas Ray a couple of times
even before she was in "Rebel",

and I knew when we went to Nicholas Ray's
apartment that I never went upstairs.

And she would tell me
the next day or two

she just thought she was
in love with Nicholas Ray,

and I said, "Natalie, he's so old."
�She's, "Well, you know I like older men."

I said, "But this is really old."
�At no time did any of the gentlemen

who were considered your bosses- did
they ever ask you to do something

that might be considered immoral? �No.

Natalie is a product of the studio system:
getting there on time in the morning,

working all day long, knowing
all of her lines all the time.

That was the training in that system, and
she came out of it in such a good way.

Not everybody did, because that system
controlled everything in your life.

You were just told what pictures you're
gonna do and what time to report.

She was owned by the studio,
and she didn't want to be owned.

She wanted to have control
over the choices.

I mean, if she's gonna spend three months
doing a film, she wants to believe in it,

so she took on Jack Warner and
told him, "I'm gonna go on strike

"because I don't like the roles
that you're choosing for me."

The suspension lasted about 18
months, so that-the punishment was

that if you wouldn't work for them,
you couldn't work anywhere else either.

Right. -It wasn't that I was trying to get
more money. �That really wasn't it at all.

But what I eventually did get
the right to do

was the right to choose one picture
a year that, you know, was my choice.

The first one that I was able
to choose was "West Side Story."

Tonight is the real beginning of
my life as a young lady of America.

With "West Side Story", she
became iconic, a great legend.

I remember going to train stations with
Natalie or going to airports with her,

and there-hundreds of people
would recognize her.

Madre de Dios, I will do anything. �Make
me die, only please make it to be true!

Today she would never be cast in that
role because she's not Puerto Rican.

That was obviously a different
time. �It's sort of interesting

that Natalie Wood would not have one
of her iconic roles today, for sure.

You didn't get nominated for an
Academy Award for "West Side Story",

but there was
a particular reason why.

Well, I was nominated for
"Splendor in the Grass." �Right.

By the age of 25, my mom had
been nominated for three Oscars.

She was nominated for Best Supporting
Actress for "Rebel Without a Cause",

she was nominated for Best Actress
for "Splendor in the Grass",

and she was nominated for Best Actress
for "Love with the Proper Stranger."

Unfortunately, she never
won, but I remember, in 1980,

my parents getting dressed up to go to
the Golden Globe Awards, and she won.

Natalie Wood. �She won a Golden
Globe for the television version

of "From Here to Eternity" with William
Devane. �This really feels nice.

Thank you very much. �I'm completely
surprised. �She always had the ability

to recognize good material,
and when she did "Splendor"

and after "West Side Story"
was a tremendous hit,

she could start to make her own
decisions on what she wanted to do

and what was available for her. �She
stepped out there and took risks.

I'm a female
past the age of consent.

I was the first woman to edit
the newspaper at my college.

And I shall remain handcuffed to this door
until I become the first female reporter

of the "New York Sentinel." -Over
my dead body. �In "The Great Race",

even though it was a comedy, she
still was playing a character

who was defending women, believed in
women, but she found out that she was not

being paid or treated equally
to Tony Curtis and Jack Lemmon,

so she went to all kinds of extremes
to make sure that everything was equal,

down to the length of the
phone cord in their rooms.

And she was one of the few women that
had the power to do that at that time.

There weren't a lot of women that
did and who were outspoken enough

and could back it up with her knowledge,
and everyone who worked with her knew it.

They all learned from her.
�There's a picture of her

where she's at the head of the table, and
then there's her publicist, her agent,

her business manager. �They all
work for her. �She's the only woman,

and she's at the head of the table.
�And she wasn't afraid to be empowered.

I certainly owe the beginning
of my career in film to her

'cause I was an actor
on Broadway in the theater,

and so she came to see a play that I
was in, came backstage to say hello.

I was very flattered,
and then that was that.

Then a while later,
when they were getting her

to do "Inside Daisy Clover",
my name came up,

but I wasn't known at all in
Hollywood, and she was the one

that stuck up for me
and said, "I want him."

And there were a lot of people
that tried to resist that,

said,
"Well, he's just not known,

and you're a big star
and he's not", and so forth.

She-"I don't care. I want to do it with
him." �There was a young lady named Cherry

who used to get swacked on sweet sherry.
�And when they said- uh, when they said.

What-what... what-what-help me! �Um...
-When they said what? �Um... -Do you think

it's a sensible drink? �That's good.

She replied...

Not very. �So once that
happened and we made that film,

then we went into
"This Property Is Condemned",

which she was desperate to make. �She's,
"Well, I'd like to stay connected to Bob",

so she just sort of
carried me along.

Just because some people
might think I'm beautiful,

that doesn't mean
I'm everybody's property.

If you really thought you were beautiful,
you wouldn't be anybody's property.

You'd be your own girl. �I
am my own girl, Mr. Legate,

and I certainly don't need
some smart aleck like you

to come along and point out
the error of my ways.

When I watch her films,
I straddle a fine line

between being caught
in her performance

and then searching for clues
about who she was.

I think many of the movies
that my mom chose

had a cathartic aspect,
"Daisy Clover" especially.

The scene in the recording booth
where she's supposed to dub herself

and we can't hear her
'cause we're outside

of the recording booth
but she's screaming...

That's how she felt on the inside.
�She was screaming on the inside,

but nobody can hear her because
she was owned by the studio.

You have, in "Daisy Clover", the
really brilliant crack-up scene.

You have another one in "Splendor
in the Grass" in the bathtub.

Those scenes must have been difficult to
do. �I think they're the kind of scenes

that one does just have to, you
know, get into a certain mood,

and it's the kind of thing that you can't
do very many times over and over again.

No, Mom! I'm not spoiled! �I'm
not spoiled, Mom! -Deanie...

I'm just as fresh and I'm virginal
like the day I was born, Mom!

Stop it! Stop it! �In the
time that my mom came of age,

nervous breakdowns and mental
institutions and suicide,

that was more of a taboo thing. �There
was a stigma about all that stuff.

Deanie, come back here! �And
in "Splendor in the Grass",

she tries to commit suicide in the water,
and then she goes to a mental institution

for two years. �She hasn't spoken a word
of sense since they brought her in here.

But in 1964, three years
after "Splendor" was released,

these themes were actually
reflected in her real life.

While she was filming "The Great
Race", she felt lonely and unhappy

and afraid of never being able to maintain
a stable and healthy relationship,

so she took enough sleeping pills to kill
herself. �When I found out about all this,

my Daddy Wagner
told me to talk to Mart

because he was spending the night
at her house when it happened.

It was an overdose and a half. �I
mean, God almighty, she was out.

And I was told that, you know, after
they pumped her stomach, they didn't know

whether she was gonna pull
through or not, but she did.

She spent the weekend in the
hospital, and on Monday morning,

she was back at work
on "The Great Race."

But I don't necessarily look at
that night as a suicide attempt.

It was really a cry for help.
�After she swallowed the pills,

she banged on Mart's door, so
obviously, she wanted to live.

I read that you were in analysis- �I
don't know if this is correct or not-

eight year-for eight years, five days
a week, in Freudian analysis. -Mm-hmm.

You must have dry-cleaned
your mother and father,

I mean, during that period of time.
�Well, I sorted out a few problems.

Dr. Judd,
don't they realize I'm me?

I don't think I could ever
go back home again.

I don't think I could ever feel the
same way �I used to feel about them.

We didn't talk a lot about her
childhood, but I knew some things,

and she needed some help, and she
wasn't gonna get that from her mom,

and it probably went way
back, undoubtedly, all of it.

So with her own significant
intelligence and a good therapist,

she was able to make sense
of some pretty severe nonsense

that had come and gone
her way. �How do you know?

Because I've been your analyst for three
years. �I know what you're capable of,

and I know what you're not capable
of. �Would you like to bet?

My reputation in psychiatry against
anything you care to put up.

Will this be enough? �I feel I
got a great deal out of analysis,

and I think a lot of people think that
analysis makes one become introspective,

and I think it does the
opposite. �I think it opens you.

I think it frees you from being locked
into your own- worrying about yourself.

One of the most wonderful things that
she ever did for me was, she convinced me

to get into analysis, and it
saved my life, without question.

I remember the day
that I saw Barbra Streisand

come to the set
to talk to Natalie

about how to block off time
to see your psychiatrist

during a movie, 'cause stars didn't have
that in their contracts at that time,

but she did. �There was nothing
out-of-bounds with Natalie.

I felt so comfortable with her. �Here's a
toast to Bob and Carol and Ted and Alice.

That's a good- I'll drink to
us. �Hats and horns. -Four...

of the grooviest people I've ever
known. �This movie was about infidelity

and these encounter groups where
people were looking into their real me

and all the things that were spanking
new at the time and very controversial.

It just seems wrong. �Oh, it's not.
�Look, it's just nice feelings.

It's something that we've never done
before. �It's physical fun. It's just sex.

I was not sure of it. �I
thought it might be exploitative

in terms of the sexual aspect of it, but
Natalie brought what the film needed:

not only a star but a
quality of intelligence

that an audience could identify
with. �And even the scene

when we're all in bed together, I
wore two pairs of jockey shorts,

but Natalie made it so
easy and so natural.

So that was a great gift
for all of us.

In 1970, she had just come off a big
success with "Bob & Carol & Ted & Alice."

My Daddy Gregson called her
"rich and happy"

because she owned points in that film, and
so I think she was in a really good place

at that time.

At one point, you had
unbelievable power for a female

when you were one of the few females
who could get a picture made,

and then you seemed to
opt out of stardom. �Why?

Oh, gosh, Rona, I don't know. �I've
been acting since I was five, really,

and I think that I came
to a point in my life

where I felt that I wanted to
live some of my life without work,

because I'd always been
so absorbed in work.

And I also got married
and wanted to have children,

and I really just enjoyed
being with them.

After I was born in 1970, my
mom took a break from acting

for maybe four or five years because
she wanted to be a stay-at-home mom.

And then slowly, you know, the
acting bug came back around,

and so she did start to feel the need
to go back to work. �May I come in?

Why the hell not?
�Better late than never.

And then when Courtney and I were
getting older, she wanted to act

with the knowledge of
being a mother. �All right.

That's little Cassie, always obedient.
�Kiss your mother. Go to confession.

Change the baby.
Shut your mouth.

"The Cracker Factory" was a big
television event of that time,

and it was very unusual
that a big movie star

was going to portray a character on
television that had so many flaws.

And I played her daughter, and
I remember her being excited

about playing real struggles of
people's families and about being real.

It was a book that I just
thought was wonderful,

and I thought what made it unusual is the
woman's real wit and her way of dealing

with the problems that she had. �And I
think it wasn't only about alcoholism.

I think it was also
about the many pressures

that face a woman,
wife, mother today.

I would hear discussions with Natalie
and RJ 'cause here they are in the bed,

and I'm over here at the desk.
�RJ was doing "Hart to Hart",

and Natalie would say, "Well, I've got
the script, 'Meteor' with Sean Connery."

And he'd say, "Well, okay,
I have a break

during this time",
because their main rule was,

they wouldn't both
be working at the same time,

that somebody would be home
for the children.

It doesn't look like you're ready to jump
rope. �Well, I think I'm gonna watch,

and I'll let the Harts jump rope
today. �But we do jump rope at home,

and the kids are gonna jump
rope, Courtney, Natasha, Katie.

I love jump rope. �Why? -Because.
�Does it make you feel good? -Yes.

Do you recommend it? �I don't know.

I think women today are trying to have it
all in the sense that we don't just choose

to be one thing or the other.

We don't just say, "Well,
now we're gonna give up career,

"sacrifice our life,
and be a wife and a mother,

or we're gonna be
a career woman, pursue that."

I mean, I think a lot of us are
trying to do all of it, you know,

without having, you know, one suffer.
�I think it was difficult for her.

She was torn by wanting to
be there with her children

in a family unit with RJ and to fulfill
this other side of her that was her core,

and I think that was a real
growing pressure. �Marker.

With your children growing up, with
your going back into doing more movies,

how would you like to see your 40th
birthday approached? �Oh, gosh.

Well, I would like to... work.
�I would like to keep working,

not necessarily at a faster speed, but
I'd like to be able to do good parts.

I loved working in "West Side Story", but
I wouldn't go back. �Today's what counts,

and RainTree helps you
make the most of it.

She was going through
a transition in age,

which Hollywood was not
very accepting of,

and even now, it's a problem once
you get those crow's-feet, you know?

Maybe you don't get
the great roles.

If you're like me, you don't
want to go back in time.

You want to stay ahead of
it. �But she was unsinkable.

She would accept that, "Yes, I'm now
40", which seems like nothing now,

"and I'm gonna work, and I'm gonna be a
woman my age, and it's gonna be great."

Come on, now. Stop holding things
back. �All right, God damn it.

I'm not sorry they're getting divorced. �I
mean, I am sorry they're getting divorced.

She had, like, two personalities,
both of which she controlled,

but when she chose to be a movie star,
she was all made up. �And, honey... -Yeah.

While you're finishing your
hot dog, think of this.

I'm not wearing anything underneath
my coat. �You're kidding.

So she was very wise about
how she dispensed herself,

the commercial side of her.
�My mom had a great publicist

named George Kirvey, and he felt,
when she was hitting her 40s,

that it was time to revamp her image.
�I was working for "Look" magazine

and "People" magazine,
and George Kirvey said,

"Maybe, you know, we want
to change Natalie's image

"to some more sensual,
maybe a little sexier,

and more of the '70s time", and we did
that, and we really accomplished that.

It's been written about: I changed the
whole professional look of Natalie Wood.

This is my favorite photo
of Natalie Wood.

This is published
all around the world.

And this is the "Anastasia" poster
portrait that we did for- you hold it up-

for the Ahmanson Theatre. �It was an
exciting time for her professionally.

I remember having conversations
with her and George

about her first stage
appearance in "Anastasia."

She was petrified of the stage
but wanted to overcome it.

During that time that Mommy
was thinking about "Anastasia",

you were working really hard. �Well,
we were still doing "Hart to Hart."

You were doing "Hart to Hart." �I
was in Hawaii, you know, on location

when she was doing
"Brainstorm" in North Carolina.

In 1981, when my mom passed away, she was
in the middle of filming "Brainstorm",

starring Christopher Walken
and Louise Fletcher.

She was shooting on location in North
Carolina, and it was kind of a big deal

because that was the first time
that my mom and my Daddy Wagner

would be working at the same time.
�I think I can get it down to size

and make it look attractive, maybe
something like stereo headphones.

I'm not worried about that. I
know you can. �It's Michael.

You're gonna have to work very closely
with him. �Is that a problem? �No.

That won't be any problem. �Okay. -Not
for me. �At first, I was very intimidated

with the idea of working with Natalie
Wood. �This is an extremely experienced

and competent actress, and Chris Walken
is kind of an experimental performer,

and he's so extraordinary.
�So I never felt any problem

with trying to make them fit together as
a couple. �From a director's standpoint,

I thought it was gonna work fine. �But one
of the things that I wanted to comment on

in the context of this interview is that
there was a love scene between the two,

a sex scene, actually, and I found
out in the shooting of that scene

that there was almost no physical
charisma between them at all,

and so that made me believe,
in retrospect now,

that the suggestion that there
was some love triangle

between Natalie and Christopher
and RJ or something like that,

whatever anybody would make of it, is
not true. �I just think it's impossible.

Based on conversations I had with
Natalie, she was not having an affair.

That's based on what
she was saying to me.

That's what I believe. �How do you
and your wife manage to combine

two successful careers and a good family
life? �She's a really wonderful lady,

and she rather makes it all
work out.

You know, she really-
it's a very difficult thing

to be a mother and an actress and have a
career and have a husband and all of that.

It's difficult because we haven't
really ever been apart this long.

This is the longest
we've been apart,

and it has been-I find it
very difficult, really,

because, you know,
we've been together so much,

and I think it's difficult for anybody
who's in love to be... away from the one-

the person that they're in love with.
�I think it really is a question

of trying to figure out how to use
your time the best way... -Mm-hmm.

And to be flexible. �Because
I think the main thing

is to try to be together as much as
possible so that everybody-you know,

so that you're
with your kids enough

and with your husband enough
and with yourself enough

and doing your own thing enough.
�When she went to North Carolina,

I remember that I would
write her these letters,

and I would cry as I was writing the
letter 'cause I missed her so much,

and then I would draw
around the tear,

and then I would write "tear" with
an arrow... �Because obviously,

she couldn't see the tear
'cause it had dried up.

Yeah, you did miss her a lot. -Yeah.
�I really missed her, and I wasn't used

to her being gone, so when she came back,

we were all really happy to see her.
�We had wrapped in North Carolina.

We were done with the location
shooting, and we were going back to LA

to shoot the interiors and set stuff back
at MGMs after the Thanksgiving holiday.

In 1981, we had Thanksgiving together as
a family at the house on Cañon Drive.

A house full of people, as always.
�Natalie had returned from North Carolina

to finish shooting
"Brainstorm" in Los Angeles,

and Daddy had come back from Hawaii,
where he had been shooting "Hart to Hart",

and it was very rainy
and stormy that weekend.

Natalie and Daddy would go out
on the boat a lot for weekends.

A lot of times,
the kids would go,

but in this case, they were
gonna have an adult weekend,

and I know that Natalie had asked
several people to join them.

Christopher Walken was in Los
Angeles to finish "Brainstorm."

He did not live in Los Angeles.
�And so naturally, she asked him

to go on the boat. �And they
asked several other friends

that just didn't feel comfortable
and didn't want to go.

It's pouring with rain the entire
Thanksgiving. �We all were at dinner.

And I thought, "Well, this is absurd."
�I mean, besides trying to get out of it

because, you know, it was clear that
RJ and Chris were arguing all the time,

I didn't want any part of it. �I remember
feeling that it was a little bit tense,

and I remember staying later
with her to see if she was okay

after we'd all had dinner,
and she told me that she was

and that she'd been under a
lot of pressure in the movie

and would I please come on the
boat, but it was my son's birthday,

so I said to Natalie, "I'm
not gonna come on the boat,

so we'll all have dinner
on the Sunday night",

and that was the last time I saw her.
�We sat up until all hours of the night

on the last night, talking, and she
was anxious about going on the boat

because she felt compromised.
�She loved the life she had,

and she loved the work, and she
knew she couldn't do both fully,

and these two men actually represented
both sides of that argument.

You know, Chris was- in her mind,
he was a free spirit, an artist,

and RJ was a responsible
husband and father.

And I said to her that I thought it
was important that she go on the boat,

that it would give her an opportunity to
work through all of this, and... silly me.

I've never forgiven myself for not going,
because I'm sure there would've been

a different dynamic somewhere.
�The last time I saw my mom

was the day after Thanksgiving
at our house on Cañon Drive.

It was raining outside, and I
didn't want them to go on the boat,

so I was hugging her,
and I was telling her,

"I love you, and I don't want
you to go on the boat",

and she was comforting me
and telling me not to worry

and that everything
would be okay.

So a few hours later,
my parents left on the boat

for Catalina with Christopher
Walken, who I didn't know very well,

and Dennis Davern, who my parents
hired to take care of the "Splendour."

She'd called me from Catalina, and
she left two messages on my machine

saying, had I heard from RJ? �She and
RJ had had an argument the night before.

The second was, she had called back to
say everything was fine, not to worry.

On the first night, Mommy had gone onto
Catalina Island and stayed in a hotel,

right? -In Avalon. �In
Avalon, right. -Yeah.

And the reason for that
was because

we couldn't pick up a mooring
inside the harbor,

so we dropped the anchor outside on the
breakwater, and it was a very rough night,

and the boat was, you know, just
going up and down, up and down,

and it was very uncomfortable.
�So you guys were kind of arguing.

Yes, that got your mother very nervous,
and so we decided that she'd go ashore,

and Chris and I stayed on board the
boat and just took watches to see

that it was all right
and everything,

and then she came back on board the next
morning, and we decided to go from Avalon

down to the Isthmus, and we were
gonna show Chris that anyway,

'cause that's where we spent our
honeymoon and all of that. -Mm-hmm.

And when we were at the Isthmus, we
tied up there, and I went to sleep

'cause I was really tired. �From the
night before. -From the night before.

Uh-huh. -And when I woke up, Chris
and your mother had gone to shore...

Mm-hmm. -To this bar that was there.
�I met them. I got a shore boat.

And, you know,
they had these boats

that came up, picked you up,
and I went and met them,

and we had dinner,
which was pretty nice,

and I remember I had, you know,
a few glasses of vino,

and I was feeling
pretty good, and...

we came back, you know, to the boat.
�I opened up another bottle of wine

and had a couple more glasses of wine,
and I sat there with Chris, and...

we started talking, and... he started
to mention to me about your mother

and how wonderful she was and
what a great actress she was

and how he enjoyed working with her, and
he said, "You know, I think it's important

that she works", and I said, "I think it's
important if you stay out of her life."

You know, I was a little teed off
about that. �Suddenly, he's telling me

what she should do and how she
should behave. �I got angry at that.

And so your mother went down
below, our stateroom, where we st-

our bedroom was down below, and she went
down below to get ready to go to bed,

and I sat there with Chris, and
I said, "Why don't you just"-

you know, "Don't tell her what to
do and, "Stay out of her life",

and I picked up the bottle
and smashed it on the table,

and, you know, I was really,
you know...

angry at him about it, and as I
look back at it, unjustifiably so,

you know, but he ducked out,
went out, went up on the top

of the deck, and I
followed him out there,

and I was still saying to him, you
know, "Just stay out of it, Chris."

You know, "Don't get involved in it. �It's
important. She's got three children."

Da-da-you know. -Yeah. �I mean, I was also
a little high at the time, I might say.

But I calmed down. �You know, I
guess me being out in the air and...

Anyway, I calmed down, and
we went back down below

and talked for a while. �You and Chris?
-Yeah. �Uh-huh. -And he went to his cabin,

which was up on the other part of
the-forward on the boat, and Dennis-

I had Dennis-you know,
we swept up the glass

off the floor
and cleaned up the salon a bit.

And we talked about leaving the
next day to go back to the mainland,

and then I went below, and when
I went below, she wasn't there,

and so I looked around. �I looked in the
bathroom, and she wasn't in the bathroom,

and I went on the aft end of the
boat, and the dinghy was gone,

and I came back up, and I
said- �I got Dennis and Chris.

I said, you know, "Natalie's not
here. "She's... she's taken off,

"I guess, on the dinghy. �I
better-did any of you hear it?"

And we-n-see, nobody heard anything.
�Right. -I didn't hear anything.

I didn't hear anything about-you know.
�We would have heard it if- I believe,

if the dinghy had fired up. �Yes. �So...

I...called a shore boat when the
guys come out, 'cause I thought

maybe she had gone back to the
restaurant or back to the Isthmus,

where there were these little slips where
you could put your boat in and go in.

I remember those. �The dinghy
wasn't there, and she wasn't there,

and I yelled up, and the guy says,
"Natalie up there?" "No, she's not here."

I got back, and the shore boat came back.
�I said, "She's not- she didn't go ashore,

at least to the Isthmus." -Right. �So it
was then that we called the shore patrol

and said, "Have you, you know, seen
anything?" "No, we haven't seen anything."

We called the coast guard.
The coast guard came in.

And then, you know,
we waited for a long-

God, it seemed like forever to me, and...
'Cause they were looking for her, right?

Yeah, they were looking for
her, and this man that I knew

and that your mother knew,
Doug Bombard,

he took care of everything
in Catalina at that time

and had all the moorings,
of which we had one,

and he said, "We found her",

and I said...

"Is she okay?"
and he said, "She's dead."

And... everything just
went out from under me.

You know, just-it just-
everything just

went away from me, and... we were
all stunned, everybody, and...

That night's gone
through my mind so many times,

you can imagine, and...

and I... �You know,
Chris was there with me.

He, by the way,
is a very stand-up guy

and a gentleman, a true gentleman.
�I remember that Mart told me

that he picked you and Chris Walken
up at the helicopter... -Pad, yeah.

And you drove to see Arthur
Malin... �Mm-hmm. -Your therapist,

because you needed to talk to him about
how you were gonna tell Courtney and I.

He said to me... "RJ", he said, "I'll just
tell you one thing. "Don't minimize it.

Just tell them actually
how devastating it is."

And I remember,
I took you in my arms,

and, you know, you were at the
bottom of the stairs. �You remember?

And I said about your mother.

And then we were all together.
�And we've been all together.

Yeah. �Thank God. �Yeah.

This afternoon, Natalie Wood was buried
in a private ceremony in Los Angeles,

attended only by family and close friends.
�The funeral was another media storm.

They weren't allowed
into the cemetery,

but they got ladders to get up on the
wall, and it was not very pleasant,

considering we were trying to pay our
respects and hold ourselves together.

There was photographers
everywhere, taking our picture,

and I was thinking,
"How can they take my picture

"when I just said good-bye to
my mom? �It seems so wrong."

I remember your grandmother's
parting shot to me,

the last thing that she ever said to me at
the funeral. �She came up to me and said,

"If you", meaning me, "if
you had been on that boat,

my daughter would be alive."

The day after the funeral,

there was a big, bizarre, hysterical party
at the house. �RJ was in bed upstairs,

and there were
all these movie stars there.

It was really odd.
I mean, to me, it was odd.

It was like Madame Tussauds
brought to life, almost,

and Elizabeth Taylor was there
with the crystal ball,

and Shirley MacLaine
was gonna heal RJ,

and it was just really completely
surreal atmosphere, I thought.

I definitely was trying
to be strong

because my Daddy Wagner
was so very fragile.

I was worried that if I was too upset
that it would be too much for him

and he would just drop dead.
�He was really suffering,

and he didn't leave the bed
for days, and then Willie Mae,

who was really part of the family, she
came up to the bedroom, and she said,

"RJ, you have to get up "and
get out of this bed right now.

Your girls think you're gonna
die." �And that was that.

Thank God for Willie Mae, you
know? �Well, I remember Willie Mae,

she helped me get up, and I
pulled myself together, and...

one foot went in front of the
other. �Slowly. �Very slowly.

The press didn't go away. �It was really
horrible. �The children couldn't go out.

They could go in the back garden, but
they certainly couldn't go out the front,

and every friend that came up
to pay their respects,

click, click, click, click, click. �Most
people can't imagine what that's like,

to live in that kind of
a fishbowl, and so RJ

didn't want to be at home
at Christmas.

We then went away for Christmas to
Switzerland to see his friend David Niven

and be there and just get away from the
mania that was going on around the house

on Cañon Drive at the time. �And RJ
brought the kids, encouraged by my father

to get out of town, and found a chalet
for RJ not far from my father's chalet.

Soon after that, my dad wanted us to go
to England to be with Richard Gregson.

It was New Year's Eve,
just after the accident.

There were reporters
hanging off the trees,

and RJ was walking around the
garden with Richard in tears,

but at the same time, we had a party.
�You know, we had fun, if that sounds odd.

There was so much activity. �When
we were traveling and stuff,

that seemed rather comforting to me. �I
think it was finally coming back home

and, like, going back to
school, that didn't feel right.

My parents had tried so hard to give us
this very stabilized and structured life,

and then when she died,
everything went upside down.

So I think it was a lot
of just surviving for a while.

When I went to pay the condolence call
to the Wagner house, he was broken.

They were all broken. �And I
had experienced loss of my own.

I had lost my ex-husband in a plane
crash. �I knew what loss felt like.

When Jill came into my life, I was
shattered. �I mean, I was totally empty,

and she had me by my elbow.
�She was holding me up,

and I was a lot of weight.
�We did fall in love

but not exactly immediately. �There
was such pain from such a loss,

and it took time. �Fortunately for us, it
evolved into something quite beautiful.

You know, in the beginning, when
Daddy Wagner and Jill started dating,

I would express to him at times that
it was painful and I didn't like it

and I didn't feel close to Jill, and
she and I talked about it in therapy.

I mean, it was definitely
a process.

After my mom passed away and even now, I
feel like I have this ever-present echo

in my ear that just sounds like it
says... "That's Natalie Wood's daughter.

That's Natalie Wood's daughter."
�You know, and I just hear that,

and the only thing I can think of that
I have to balance that weird feeling

is my sister Natasha,
you know, and my sister Katie.

I just thank God we had each other
during that and just in life anyway,

because I'm so, so close
with my sisters.

Courtney was so young.
She was only seven.

To think that she lost her mom at that age
is unimaginable, and I think she wanted

to numb the pain, she wanted to stop it,
so she struggled with drugs and alcohol

for a really long time, and there
were times when I absolutely thought

that I would lose my sister.

When we as a family addressed
Courtney's struggles,

we were all able to speak
from our hearts

things, perhaps, we hadn't
vocalized before of how we felt,

and I believe it brought us
closer as a family.

The main thing that sobriety has brought
me is that that is where I can have

total control of my life. �I
thought that the other night.

I thought, "You know what?
"I'm in control of my life now,

and I don't have to worry
about anything."

When my mom was alive, she always said
that I wore my heart on my sleeve,

and I did. �But when she died,

I didn't have a safe place
anymore to be vulnerable,

so I armored myself to the outside
world with, "I'm fine. I'm okay.

"I don't need your pity. �I'm
just fine, thank you very much."

But after my mom died, I found
a lot of strength and clarity

from being in therapy, and I knew
that I wanted to have a child.

That was really important, and
after my daughter was born,

I was flooded with so much happiness and
gratitude, so I named my daughter Clover,

not necessarily after the character
that my mom played, Daisy Clover,

but mostly because clovers are lucky
and I felt so lucky to have her.

And having my daughter has been
the most healing thing for me.

There's a development tonight in one
of Hollywood's most enduring mysteries,

the death of Natalie Wood. �What
do we think about, recently,

them reopening this case? �Wood's
death was ruled an accidental drowning,

but in 2011, Los Angeles sheriff's
detectives reopened the case

after Dennis Davern coauthored a book in
which he gave a very different account

of what happened that night. �I
believe that Robert Wagner was with her

up until the moment she went into the
water. �I mean, I know how I feel.

I feel like people just want to
have some kind of media storm.

This new information
is substantial enough

for us to want to take another look at the
case. �Is Robert Wagner a suspect? -No.

Oh, the-it's just
so transparent to me.

They can print anything
that they want to print today,

and, you know, there was the coast
guard. �There was the highway patrol,

the police department.
�Everybody was on this.

When it first happened, yes. -When it
first happened. �Shortly after midnight

of the Sunday morning,
she apparently attempted

to get onto the dinghy,

slipped,
and fell in the water,

unable to return
to the dinghy or the boat.

Noguchi said there was no evidence of
foul play. �He did indicate, however,

that tests revealed Ms. Wood
was technically drunk

but continually referred to Wood's
condition as "slightly inebriated."

He nevertheless admitted that
alcohol might have been one reason

why the actress
was rendered unconscious.

When the toxicology report
came out after Natalie drowned,

it was clear that there was a
lot of alcohol in her system.

There was also a Dalmane, the
sleeping pill that she took.

The assumption was, when she went
down below, she could have gone out

to retie the dinghy. �Well, I
remember it used to drive her crazy,

and she would always say,
"RJ, can you move the dinghy?

Yeah, 'cause it- -'Cause the way the water
hit up against the boat, it would bang,

and she was so sensitive to noise.
�Yeah, and when she went out there, was-

it was a slight mist that night...
�Mm-hmm. -And the assumption is that

she went out and slipped and hit her
head and rolled into the water. -Mm-hmm.

But there's always conjecture
about someone who's very famous,

and your mother was a very famous person.
�And there's always conjecture, I think,

you know, that always comes
up but not to this degree.

I mean, this has really been something
that the media has taken over.

We were approached by a news agency who
wanted to take another look at the case.

We thought it was a good idea
to try and go ahead and do that.

What's a person of interest? �Just
that. He's a person of interest

like... he was there with her, last
person with her before she ends up dead.

How does it make you feel when
they call you a person of interest?

I don't pay very much
attention to it, Natasha,

because they're not gonna
redefine me. �That's right.

You know, they're not gonna
redefine me. �I know who I am.

But it's important to me,
Daddy, that people

think of you
the way I know that you are,

and it bothers me
that anyone would ever think

that you would be involved
in what happened to her,

because you would've given your life for
my mom. �And that's true. I would've.

We all would've. I mean, if there
was an- if we'd have heard anything

or known anything that was going on or
any kind of disaster was gonna take place,

we'd have been there. �Have
you ever been back to Catalina?

No, I never have gone back
to the island.

I see it once in a while. �You
know how sometimes you can see it,

it's so clear? -Mm-hmm. �Or if
I'm taking off from LAX, you know,

they turn to the south, and you go by the
island, and I look down at the Isthmus,

and I think of all of the
great times that we had there

and all of the wonderful
life-giving experiences,

and... you know, it's just so
ironic that this all happened,

you know, that it came
to an end like that, so...

No, but I never have been back. �Do
you have any interest in going back?

Not particularly, no. �Do
you think that the real story

of Natalie Wood's death has actually
come out? �The real story of her death

is that she...

Drowned, and... nobody
knows how she drowned

or what happened except... her.

Even if you have black
and white in the situation,

the tabloid media will create gray,
so every year around the anniversary

of Natalie's death, you'd always
start to see things pop up,

'cause that's when they can sell the most.
�And I've had conversations with editors.

"Why do you keep running
these awful stories today?"

"Because they still want to read about
it, so they're still making us money."

A lot of people have made money
off of Natalie Wood's death.

On that level, they're just barracudas.
�They're just feeding on something

that means nothing to them, and
because this meant so much to us,

to ever exploit this situation
would be criminal to do that,

and I know there are people
who want to talk about it,

but they're doing it for themselves,
and how dare they? �How dare they?

I think the investigation was
mishandled from the beginning.

Things were oversimplified and ignored.
�Conspiracy is a bit far-fetched,

but were things covered up and overlooked
purposefully? �I'm certain they were.

What I read in the press and I see
on these TV shows when Lana appears

really upsets me 'cause it
hurts RJ, it hurts the girls,

it hurts the memory of Natalie,
and it makes me sad and angry.

Are you suggesting that he
knocked her out in some way

and threw her in the water, or- �It
is something like that, absolutely.

Natalie was very kind to Lana,
very respectful of her situation,

because Natalie was the one who was
the big success with the parents,

and Natalie took great care of
her. �Lana became an actress,

I think, because her sister was a
star, and her name was not Wood,

but her mother changed it to Lana Wood.
�I don't know; the whole thing with Lana,

it's just... �I don't even think
she believes what she's saying.

I think she's just angry,
and I can understand that.

I can understand being angry.

I can certainly understand
having misplaced feelings.

I can understand all of that, but
when I just think about, like, my dad

having to deal with any of this stuff,
it's just so hard to even imagine

when, you know, he experienced, like, a
true nightmare. �I mean, a true nightmare.

One thing that I've heard Lana
say is that my stepdad, RJ,

kept her away from us, but I don't
have a memory of being close to Lana

even before my mom died. �When she
would come to our house on Cañon Drive,

it always felt like she was more
focused on my mom than Courtney or me,

so I never had that kind
of relationship with her

that my daughter has
with my sisters.

And she's literally accused
my dad of killing my mom

when that's the farthest thing
from the truth.

Sadly, some of the residue of
the tragedy will always be there,

because people like drama,
don't they, and tragedy,

and they'll have theories about it.
�And even my friends sometimes say-

you know, they almost, like,
take you aside and say,

"Okay, you can tell me
what really happened",

as if you have
some great scoop on it.

Natalie Wood falls into the category
of Marilyn Monroe, Elvis Presley.

They were such icons, the things about
their passing will always be brought up.

But Natalie is not a headline.
�Natalie was a life well lived.

It was foreshortened, but she
did a lot in that lifetime

for her children, for her friends, for
the industry. �She made a difference.

It's really sad
that she died when she did,

because it'd be really great
to see what she was gonna do

as a woman in her 40s and 50s and the
kinds of roles she would take on over time

because she was always grappling
with what it means to be a woman

in different stages of life.
-Ah!

But that's the great thing
about being an actor.

You're always alive. Those movies
still exist. �Natalie was unique.

She doesn't have a false moment
in her films. �She didn't "act."

She found something in her gut, in
her heart, and in her intellect,

and she applied all of that. �I love you,
Mother. �And young women seeing that now,

supposing you decide to catch one
of these movies, you'd be struck

by a multidimensional young woman
unafraid to show her vulnerabilities,

her passion, her strength, and her
intelligence. �All of that is there.

Won't you join me back in the
limelight, little lady of pain?

All she was ever looking for was the
comfort of good friends, good people,

and being able to be a normal
human being. �That was her search.

It was so hard against the
reputation of being a movie star.

And I witnessed her desire,
her reaching out

to try to be just a regular human
being against the odds of being treated

like a movie star, and
she did it beautifully.

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