Tue 11/30 @ 7PM
Natalie Wood won hearts as a child actress in the beloved 1947 holiday film, Miracle on 34th Street, filmed when she was just 8. She made a long series of films in the late 4s and early 50s, then made the rare smooth transition to teen star, co-starring with James Dean and Sal Mineo in Rebel Without a Cause when she was 16. In her early 20s, she appeared opposite Warren Beatty in 1961’s Splendor in the Grass and West Side Story that same year, again defying expectations and supercharging her adult career.
While her work tapered off in the 70s, she was firmly fixed as an iconic movie star in people’s minds. So when she died under mysterious circumstances right after Thanksgiving 1981, slipping off a boat in the middle of the night and drowning at the age of 43, it attracted a huge amount of attention — and speculation.
As a result, there’s a great deal of interest in a new book written by her sister Lana Wood, also an actress, eight years younger than Natalie, titled Little Sister: My Investigation into the Mysterious Death of Natalie Wood. Like many, Lana Wood believes her sister’s death may not have been an accidental drowning; she presents new information about Natalie’s life and relationships that were not previously revealed, including some about incidents prior to her death.
Lana Wood will be the guest of the Hudson Library & Historical Society for a virtual author event. It’s free, but you must register. Go here. Copies of her book will be available for purchase through Hudson’s Learned Owl Book Shop.