Natalie Wood Biography

American actress Natalie Wood was born with the birth name of Natalia Nikolaevna Zakharenko, of Russian emigre stock.

Her parents hardly spoke any comprehensible English, and changed their family name to Gurdin upon becoming US citizens.

Wood made her first film appearance, aged four, as an extra in 'Happy Land' in 1943. She was picked after a production company had come to Santa Rosa, and spotted her for the role of 'crying baby'.

She took dancing lessons as soon as she could walk, and, by 1947, in supporting roles in films such as 'Miracle on 34th St', she earned up to $1,000 per week. A prolific child star, she appeared in no less than 18 films in the late 1940s and early 1950s.

Aged 17, she landed her breakthrough adult role, as James Dean's girlfriend, in 'Rebel Without a Cause', which resulted in her first Oscar nomination.

Her next major roles were opposite Warren Beatty in 'Splendour in the Grass' and in the musical 'West Side Story', both in 1961. Receiving another Oscar nomination for the former, she followed up with her sterling performance in 'Love With A Proper Stranger' opposite Steve McQueen for which she received a Golden Globe and Oscar Nomination.

Having married film star Robert Wagner in 1957, they separated in 1962. She claimed to have had a crush on the actor since childhood and her film studio arranged a date with the 26-year-old actor on her 18th birthday. They married a year later.

Her Russian language skills came in handy for the 1965 film 'The Great Race', which was a slapstick comedy also starring Jack Lemmon, Tony Curtis and Peter Falk. Her character tracked the race across Siberia.

Films such as 'Gypsy' (1963), 'Inside Daisy Clover'(1967) and 'Bob and Carol and Ted and Alice' (1969) continued her prominence.

On 30 May 1969, Wood married film producer Richard Gregson. They had dated for two years prior to the wedding. They had a daughter Natasha on 29 September 1970, heralding the start of her semi-retirement. She only appeared in four films after this point.

Wood overheard an inappropriate phone conversation between her husband and her secretary, leading them to divorce in April 1972.

She remarried Wagner again on 16 July 1972 following their reconciliation five months earlier, and spent the next decade mainly in TV, with the series 'From Here To Eternity'. Wood gave birth to Courtney Wagner on 9 March 1974.

Whilst filming a sci-fi film, 'Brainstorm', with Christopher Walken in 1981, she drowned in a yachting accident. She was only 43. 'Brainstorm' was eventually released in 1983.

Her body was found floating in a Catalina cove wearing a long night gown, socks and a jacket. She had cuts and bruises and the police ruled that it was an accident at the time.

On 18 November 2011, the Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department announced it would be reopening the case following the emergence of new evidence.

It is thought that the captain of the yacht has remembered some information about the incident. He published memoirs called 'Goodbye Natalie, Goodbye Splendour' in which he states Wood and Wagner had a fight the night before she died.

Wagner's publicist said that the family welcomes the reopening of the case.