Film director Elia Kazan said about Natalie Wood that “her eyes lingered on whoever she was speaking to, clinging to them with her eyes.” Kazan knew that there was something magical about Natalie Wood and it translated onto the screen in film. Her most famous movie roles continue to inspire new generations of fans.
“Natalie Wood: The Complete Biography” by Suzanne Finstad was fascinating to read and was informative. I would also say it contained many repetitive observations that were told and re-told so many times it became annoying. Over a period of four years Finstad interviewed a massive number of people and traveled everywhere Natalie Wood went during her life to write this highly detailed biography. If you are looking for a biography of Natalie Wood that details her private life from birth to her untimely death, this is a good one. If you’re looking for discussion of her best and worst film and TV appearances, then you should seek out maybe Ebert or Maltin, etc.
Beyond the repetitive nature of the work, Finstad made countless assumptions concerning Natalie’s state of mind, inner turmoil, and mental health. On numerous occasions the same exact phrases and statements concerning Natalie’s psychological turmoil was repeated despite if Natalie was eight years old or thirty-something.
The final third of the book is all about Natalie’s death and Finstad inserts herself into the narrative, at times seeming like an amateur Nancy Drew or fanzine journalist trying desperately to prove her beloved Natalie was murdered by Robert Wagner (by the way … maybe he did do it!) These factors alone gave the book a rough, amateurish style more suited to a weekly tabloid than a polished, professional biography.
Otherwise, it contains enough material to keep you following the narrative if you have patience and perhaps skim read numerous redundant passages.
Natalie was the product of abuse, neglect, and immense pressure to succeed as a child actor. Her mother was a compulsive liar and a quite a character. Her father was an alcoholic who would fly into alcohol-driven rages. Finstad constantly draws direct lines and makes connections between her parent’s behavior as the cause for Natalie’s various phobias, anxieties, fears, neurosis, and other issues. True, Natalie openly discussed many of these things with family and friends. Often a person is convinced they have a problem when it may be something else entirely. Finstad, of course, was not Natalie Wood’s psychiatrist, and had no access to any private documents of that nature.
For example, Natalie Wood called her public persona “The Badge” and made a distinction between this and her private self. As a celebrity and public figure, she was acutely aware that she wanted to project a smiling, agreeable, professional image on set and out in public despite her inner turmoil, whatever that may have been at any given moment. This doesn’t mean that Natalie Wood had a split personality or other psychological condition. This was her practiced, measured behavior when out in public to be successful and project an image of a screen star.
I won’t rehash the salacious parts of the book which discusses the ‘greatest hits’ of Natalie Wood’s Hollywood scandals since the 1950’s.
Seemingly everyone has an opinion concerning Natalie’s death, yet despite Finstad’s book examining so many desperate scraps of details there remains a mystery concerning a missing hour and a half to two hours after she entered the water.
Why did it take Robert Wagner (Natalie’s husband) over two hours to call the Coast Guard to search for her or rescue her? How and why did she get in the water? Why was the dinghy untied from the boat? Although Christopher Walken and the yacht captain, Dennis Davern, were both onboard that night there remains a question about what they knew and had seen and if either of them is complicit in anything that may have contributed to Natalie’s death. Many questions remain. In fact, the ME of Los Angeles changed the cause of death to mysterious circumstances and the case was reopened in 2011 making Robert Wagner a ‘person of interest.’ Christopher Walken has been deposed since and has been cooperative.
Davern has been a frustrating and opportunistic individual giving vague and partial information over the years in bits and drabs to various magazines for cash. There were people on a nearby boat who heard Natalie’s screams for over 20 minutes and since her death suddenly they never spoke another word on the matter.
I often think of Christopher Walken as a guy simply who was out on a boat drunk with three other drunk people and he was stuck in a bad situation. This may be true. It also might be true that his behavior, knowingly or unknowingly, fueled a violent drunken rage in Robert Wagner.
A man when drunk and in a rage, can unleash jealous, violent, or abusive behavior he would never even consider when sober.
I’ve always tried to reserve judgement about Robert Wagner. He is detailed in this book as bisexual and guilty of second-degree murder or manslaughter. Both things he fervently denies in the few instances he has spoken to the police or to the press on this matter; however, bisexuality is nothing to be ashamed of these days.
Has Robert Wagner been carrying a terrible, awful guilt-ridden private memory of that night? Or is he simply a loving husband who had a famous wife who accidently drowned after falling off his boat?
Based on what I’ve read, so far, I think Robert Wagner pushed Natalie Wood off the boat in a violent drunken, jealous rage. It is also possible that he saw her floating in the water nearby the boat and assumed she was safe since she was floating seemingly out of danger or clinging to the dinghy. I will end my own speculation there, but I could add many more detailed ideas that are possible or plausible.
Lana Wood, Natalie’s sister, will publish a new memoir “Little Sister: My Investigation into the Mysterious Death of Natalie Wood (due out November 9, 2021). Apparently, the yacht captain Davern revealed everything he knew and had seen on that fateful night only to Lana.
Natalie Wood was an actress at a pivotal moment in film history when a whole new generation of filmmakers, actors and technicians began making highly personalized films and forged radically different styles of expression. In many ways, Natalie was able to bridge this gap in her own career from an older generation because she started out so young and with each film role, she gave voice to a new character based on the screenplay and the creative team involved. Several of Natalie Wood’s made for TV movies are yet to be discovered by fans along with some of her lesser-known films she made in the 1960s such as “This Property Is Condemned,” and “Sex and the Single Girl,” and “Love with the Proper Stranger.” I haven’t seen “Inside Daisy Clover,” but I read that although overlooked in theatrical release it has grown in popularity.
I think it’s great to have an added depth of understanding to Natalie’s real life and the way she struggled to find happiness, love, and family. However, I wonder if some of the negative aspects of Finstad’s book would be unforgivable to the average reader.
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Absorbing, Unmatched Wood Biography
Reviewed in the United States on October 9, 2020
Breathtaking, devastating, impeccably written. Whether you come in interested in Wood or not, you will be engrossed by her story. Finstad is a skillful writer and researcher, with the ability to weave evocative prose into what is foremost a historical account. Her findings warrant an updated edition. Pick it up now.
Reviewed in the United States on October 9, 2020
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marianne cherniuk
not enough of the movie star who grew up
Reviewed in Canada on December 23, 2021
