Stuff You Should Know - The Tragic Death of Natalie Wood

Episode Date: November 14, 2023

Natalie Wood was Hollywood royalty who tragically drowned after a long night of partying with her husband, Robert Wagner, and actor Christopher Walken. Over the last 40 plus years, stories have changed and the investigation has moved from closed to open. Listen in to learn this tragic story. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

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will I find that special someone? It's time to find out. Listen to 28 Dates Later with me Grace Campbell on the iHeart Radio app, Will I find that special someone? It's time to find out. Listen to 28 dates later with me Grace Campbell on the I Heart Radio app Apple Podcast or wherever you get your podcasts. Welcome to Stuff You Should Know, a production of I Heart Radio. Hey and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh and Chuck's here too and Jerry's here too and this is stuff you should know. Part of our ongoing indefinitely continuous, reprimadition. That's right. And weirdly our second Paul Eftompkin's reference is coming on this episode.

Oh yeah. Yeah, because Paul's wonderful hysterical wife, Jayny, looks like Natalie Wood. OK. Is she known for that? I mean, I don't know if she's internationally known, but I think Jayny knows it in her friends, know it, and it has been set out loud. I got to.

That's what I'm after. I don't know if this is just your observation or not. Oh, no, no, no. It's been said before. That's that's what I'm after. I don't know if this is just your observation or not. Oh, no, no, no It's it's been it's been said before it's on record. So If you don't know who Natalie Wood is first go look up Janie Tomkins you get a pretty good idea You could also look up Natalie Wood herself sure But you probably are familiar with her one way or another first of all She probably captured your heart as the little girl who doubted the existence of Santa Claus of Miracle on 34th Street, the original one. She might have also captured your heart as the kind of good girl gone bad in rubble without a cause.

She also may have been like, I like that girl in West Side Story, or I like that girl in Spongebob and the Grass. Or I like that girl in the 1976 made for TV remake of Cat on a Hot 10 Roof. Well, then you'd like Natalie Wood, guys. Yeah, or if you grew up like we did in the 80s, you might like her from the sci-fi Classic, not classic 80s early 80s sci-fi classic brainstorm. I never saw it. Oh really? Yeah Check it out. It was sort of one of those it was in the early 80s like there were a few Few of those movies that were kind of in the same vein of do you remember the movie looker? Yes Like with Albert Finney.

And then there was the Tom Selequen about the little rope with Gene Simmons with the little robot. Run away. Run away. It was in that vein sort of. Oh, okay. Well, that sounds like a great triple feature,

if you ask me. It's kind of right up your alley. I bet you'd like it. Okay, I'll check that one out. I have not seen that. I was familiar with the from Rebel without a cause because I went through a real big James Dean phase in high school.

Oh, yeah. You might also be familiar. Yeah. You might also be familiar with her sister, Lana Wood. Yeah. She was Plenty O'Toole and Diamonds are forever. She was very well known for that. And both of these sisters were originally named Zacharynko.

They were the daughters of Russian immigrants Maria and Nick Zacharynko. They were the daughters of Russian immigrants Maria and Nick Zacharynko who moved to San Francisco and had these two kids and their mom said you're both going to be stars, especially you Natalie born Natalia. That's right. And Lana was born what? Svetlana. So they kind of Americanize their names. Kind of. And you know, we're going to be reading through a few different, Olivia helped us with this, but she got a lot of the stuff from a few different biographies. So if we reference like Suzanne Finstead's biography or maybe Robert Wagner's biography or autobiography, that's what we're talking about. Yeah, we're Sam Caschner wrote a very great vanity fair article on it autobiography, that's what we're talking about. Yeah, our Sam Cashner wrote a very great

vanity fair article on it. Oh, that's right, very good one. But Suzanne Finnstad's biography recounts the childhood that wasn't as great as it seemed from the outside, that her father was an alcoholic. Her mother was a very controlling sort of manager of her career and would organize meetings with the very experienced men and actors trying to get her foot in the door, including one incident

where she did so with Kirk Douglas, where she was, while she says she was raped by Kirk Douglas when she was, well, she says she was raped by Kirk Douglas when she was 16. At one of these meetings at the Chateau Mourmont, and it was kept secret for many, many years until Kirk Douglas died, and then Lana came out and said, well, I feel like I should reveal who this person was now. And I think this was in her book that she wrote about her sister. So there was also that account of her life.

Yeah. So that's just correct, Douglas. Apparently her mom arranged sexual liaisons when she was 15 with Frank Sinatra. To get this part in rubble without a cause. She apparently had to prove she was capable of being a bad girl by sleeping with the director who was 44 at the time. I think she was 16 then too. And her mom was like complicit in all of this. Like she's just like, this is the price for entry and Hollywood, sorry kid, just keep your mouth shut and your chin up. Which is, I just can't imagine the damage

of just these instances, but then of being like that dismissed and unsupported by your mom, just I can, it's just awful. But what's amazing is that she managed to stay alive and actually thrive over the years because she did develop a really amazing career, especially early on in the 60s. Yeah, you mentioned all those classic movies she was in. In 1957, she married for the first time Robert Wagner, who you and I, Josh would go on to know as the lead actor in

the 80s TV show Heart to Heart. Co-star Stephanie Powers. Stephanie Powers, but in the 1950s, he was an actor, kind of, you know, it wasn't super famous, but he acted a lot. And then his star rose as hers was kind of fading. But they divorced in 1961 on their first marriage. Some people say magazines, especially back then, said that Natalie Wood, they broke up because she had an affair with Warren Beatty, her splinter in the grass co-star. Sam Cashner in his article says, yeah, this basically is what happened.

But in the Finn-Stad biography, she's like, no, no, no. That is not true at all. And including Lana, we'll back this up, says, Natalie stumbled upon RJ, her husband having relations with a man and had a suicide attempt, which is one of several apparently, and that's what happened to their first marriage. Yeah, but she allowed the press to say that she had had an affair with Warren Beatty. The reason that that held water, even if it wasn't true, is because they were very close

on the set of splendinter in the grass. They had just their characters had like just this crazy sizzling love affair. And as actors, it's tough to separate those things, I believe. And Warren Beatty had a certain reputation. Yes. So, apparently, that is what Robert Wagner thought. He thought that they were having an affair. And he was very jealous and very protective and just felt cuckolded, I guess, by this, even though supposedly it didn't even happen. But that's a really important point. That was one of the reasons they broke up was he was very jealous and very

overprotective of his relationship with her. That's right. She got married to a gentleman named Richard Gregson after that in 1969. He's a British writer and actor, just sort of, you know, producer, film industry guy. They had their daughter Natasha, who goes by Natasha Gregson Wagner. Although she's married now, she may have added another name to the end of her name. I'm not sure. McGillicutty. McGillicutty. But she is an actor too. I haven't seen anything in a little while. I'm not sure she's still in doing that because she's, I know she made a documentary recently about her mom, but I remember seeing her in a few movies back in the day that she did a really good one with Robert Downey Jr.

and I can't think of the name of it now. Lesson Z- oh, oh, I know who it is. The last days of disco? No. Pick up artist. No. He wasn't in the last days of disco. Oh, what was it?

I can't remember. Lesson zero? No. Weekend at Bernice. I think it was just like three people in the movie. It was very small. Oh, no, you know what? It was We can at Bernice. I think it was just like three people in the movie. It was very small. Oh, no, you know what? It was we can at Bernice.

There. So she married Wagon, I'm sorry, Gregson. And during that same period, Wagoner married a woman named Mary and Marshall. They had a daughter named Katie in 64. And then they eventually remarried in 72 and had a daughter named Courtney. So now there are three daughters, one that Wood and Wagner had together and one of each from previous marriages. For her part, Lana Wood was like, why did, why are you getting back together with this

guy? And as recounted in her book, Natalie said that sometimes the devil you know is better than the devil you don't. Yeah. And the reason why Lana Wood or Lana Wood was even questioning her was because they had a tumultuous relationship while they were married the first time, but apparently they never fell out of love or they never stopped loving each other. There's how I saw it put. I think in an investigation discovery documentary. And so they remarried in 1972. They had Courtney in 1974.

And basically just went back to married life, but now with a family, with three daughters. That was a big difference between their first go-around. They were trying to make the family work. And apparently it was going fairly well. Yeah, he was a little older, or when he like seven or eight years older? Eight. I think or eight years older eight I think eight years older

And yeah, he got that role in heart to heart and so he started you know doing pretty well in the industry while you know and you know It's the same as true today and an actress in her forties They start looking elsewhere generally speaking unless, unless you're, you know, like a marital street or somebody, you're not going to get the calls that you used to get, and that's what happened, certainly with Natalie Wood, after great, great fame, and then 1960s, 50s into the 60s, and then it started to sort of tail off into the 70s. Yes, but if you're a man in Hollywood, and as you start to age, you become distinguished.

It's a different way of your career, and that's certainly what happened with Robert Wagner No, he wasn't washed up at 43. I guess he would have been almost 50. Yeah, he actually his his star started to rise again so they had oppositional careers as far as time went Mm-hmm and that that figures in by the way, that's the reason we're talking about this. Right. So, it's November 1981. They've been married again for nine years, and Natalie Woods 43, Robert Wagner's 51,

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Okay Chuck, so in Thanksgiving 1981, the weekend after after Robert Wagner and Natalie Wood took their yacht out the splendor of 60 foot yacht pretty nice apparently had five state rooms the whole deal it was like a legit yacht Robert Wagner was a boat guy a Yacht guy really I think now they took it to say to Santa Catalina island better known as Catalina island I think like 20 miles off the coast of Los Angeles and I've never been there But I get the impression that it is very yacht-friendly

Almost like the South coast of France is how I kind of take it Where very rich people put their yachts in and then go and party in town and then go party from yacht to yacht. And so they showed up Thanksgiving weekend. It's in Ketalina Island looking to have a good time. Yeah, they originally were going to have a lot more friends on board, but apparently the weather was the forecast was a little dodgy. And so the only person that came along was Christopher Walken, who said, it takes more than a few rain drops to frighten me. Not bad. Didn't you interview Christopher Walken on movie crush once?

Yeah, sure I did. Pretty cool. Listen to that episode. It's great. And also listen to the Kevin Pollock episode. So the reason that Christopher Walken was there, because you're just like, well, that's a little random Natalie Wood, Robert Wagner, Christopher Walken. He was an up and coming actor at the time. I'm not even sure. Did he have the dead zone under his belt yet?

I mean, he had done. He did the deer hunter by then. Annie Hall and the deer hunter. And I don't know if Dead Zone, it was right around there. But he was doing this thing a little bit. He was like Hollywood's guy actor at the time. Like he was in demand. And he was co-starring in this movie, brainstormed with Natalie Wood. So she invited her co-star friend to the yacht and he was the only one that came

out of this whole group. And then very noteworthy is the fourth person, Dennis Davern. He was the captain of the yacht. And so the four of them were on this yachting weekend after Thanksgiving. That's right. Actually, Deadzone came out that very year. So he was, this is kind of early peak walking. Okay. So on Saturday, the 28th of Thanksgiving weekend, they ate dinner at Doug's Harbor Reef on Catalina. They got very, very drunk. The manager there said that he was even worried that they couldn't get back. They had a little inflatable motorized dinghy, you know, that's what you do. And he had that yacht to go to shore. I was called the Prince Valiant, which is also the name of a early Robert Wagner movie.

And obviously Splinter was named after Splinter in the grass. So they had their little boats. Hers was the yacht name. His was the dinghy name, which is interesting. And he hated his role in Prince Valiant. He felt it was his worst role. He was apparently mocked for it widely. So it was kind of like tongue and cheek that he needed to smell about Valiant. Yeah, that makes sense then. But the night manager there at Doug's Harbor Reef was like, I don't even know if these guys are so drunk. I fear for

their safety of just getting back onto the splendor. So, he said, hey, harbor patrol person, can you make sure they get back safely? They left about 10, 10, 30 at night. And then at 1.30 in the morning, Robert Wagner and Captain Davern made a call to the shore, saying, you know, Natalie, what has has gone missing we need your help is one thirty a.m. two hours later at three thirty they call the coast guard to get a formal search going and then very tragically at seven forty five in the morning uh... davran identify the body of Natalie Wood uh... about a mile south of where the out was anchored

uh... in a flannel nightgown socks and a red down jacket yep the dinghy they found washed up on the shore. I'm very, very importantly, the ores were locked, so they had not been used to row. The ignition was off, so it had not been turned on. And yet it was just kind of washed away from the boat. This was an enormous deal. I mean, Natalie Wood was already like Hollywood legend. And what's more, she was,

one of the reasons she was having trouble getting parts was not just her age, but she was old Hollywood. And Hollywood had started to transition in the 70s into like a newer version of itself and kind of resented the old studios and stuff. So she was like Hollywood royalty at this time already. And the idea that she died from unnatural causes was just, I mean, it was just a sensation right out of the gate. Yeah, I mean, I remember this. I was a kid, but I was a kid who devoured

entertainment tonight. The TV show when that first came out, which was somewhere around here. I remember being about that age when that TV show premiered. And I would watch it every night and keep up with that stuff. And I remember very distinctly Natalie Wood dying and drowning. And her husband, I was like, the heart to heart guy. And kind of out of the gate

it was portrayed as an accident and that's sort of what you know this podcast is going to detail is the way the story has changed over the years, the suspicions that it wasn't just a simple accident and it kind of started off with the autopsy. There was a medical examiner named Joseph Choi who said that Nally Woods blood alcohol content level was 0.14, which is very high. Yeah, let me just, I looked that up. I, because I'm like, okay, what does that actually mean in like, like physical behavioral terms? Yeah.

According to the South Australia government, 0.08 to 0.15, so just above what Natalie Wood had in her bloodstream, you can expect slurred speech, impaired balance, unstable emotions, possible nausea, and vomiting. Just above 0.15, you can't control your bladder, and you probably will need help walking around. So she was very drunk at the time she died. Yeah, and if you want to be very, very technically bored,

you should go listen to our episode on breathalyzers. Yeah, they were really difficult to explain. That was a beast. And I'm surprised we don't remember that more often when we're asked what episodes have been the hardest or worst. Definitely the hardest, because there's like a crystal involved that somehow like tells you're a fortune and then they translate that into ones and zeros. A very, very tough episode. But it's out there.

So Choi said 0.14% and also said that. That's a medical examiner, right? Yeah, and also said that there were bruises on her arms and legs and face. And basically said, you know, it looks like she probably fell overboard. She was trying to get into the dinghy. She was very drunk. And these bruises and things were, is evidence of her kind of doggedly trying

to get back on board unsuccessfully. There was a chief medical examiner named Thomas Naguchi for the county who said, yeah, and if you look at the dinghy here, there's scratches on the side of it. Clearly, she was trying to pull herself back up on this thing, but she was in that down jacket and became very, very heavy. And she probably just held on to that dinghy and got hypothermia and exhausted and she drowned.

And it's an accident. Yeah, so that was the official line for a very long time. For some reason, Natalie Wood tried to, yeah, tried to get into the valiant, the dinghy late at night. She was very drunk, and as she was trying to get into the dinghy, she slipped and fell and drowned. She was well known as a strong swimmer, or not a strong swimmer,

and not very good at swimming at all. The opposite of a strong swimmer or not a strong swimmer. I'm not very good at swimming at all. The opposite of a strong swimmer. The thing is, is that doesn't explain why she tried to get into the dinghy at night. That was, it's always been an outstanding question. And so Thomas Noguchi, the chief medical examiner for the Los Angeles County Coroner's Office, commissioned a psychological autopsy, which is a thing.

But from what I can tell, it's a thing that you commissioned when you're trying to show that a suspicious death that seems accidental was actually suicide, like they take into account like the person's life history, their family history, social interactions, what they were doing right before they died. So it's kind of odd that he had this commissioned. It was even odd that when he got it back, he's like, I'm not releasing to the public. And he said that he was afraid that he would be accused of sensationalism. That ship had already sailed. He was very much despised by Natalie Wood's friends and just Hollywood in general because

he made the grave mistake of mentioning that she was drunk when she died accidentally at the press conference about her death and their findings. And he received the ire of Frank Sinatra, screen actors, guild, and generally all of Hollywood and ended up being demoted from his position at the top of the coroner's office to uh... not chief they actually assigned him the title not chief examiner anymore yeah i i think it was definitely one of those cases where she was hollywood royalty like you said and no one in the world wants to hear that

natalie would got so drunk that she slipped in fell into the water and drown. No, it's Tadry. Yeah, and so they tried to, you know, they tried to keep that quiet. It was, you know, when he mentioned it at the press conference, it was a big deal. And now we get into sort of the, you know, what happened after three decades and how the story has changed over the years. Yeah, because just one thing, one thing Chuck, if that were it, and the story stayed straight all these years and nothing ever changed,

it would be fishy, but not a big deal. The reason that it's a big deal and we're talking about it today is that over the years, the people who are there change their stories. And that's why it goes from kind of fishy to an all-out mystery. Yeah, an all-out mystery and scandal really, that you know how many years later is this, people are still sort of talking about it, people are some people are still obsessed with it and

writing books about it. For Wagner's part he has done like I mentioned earlier, there was an 86 authorized biography, Heart to Heart, spelled with an E this time, not like the mentioned earlier, there was an 86 authorized biography, Heart to Heart, spelled with an E this time, not like the TV show, because on the TV show they were the hearts, the HARTs. But he couldn't get the use of the studio. He wanted to pay for that. So Heart to Heart with Robert Wagner, and he said in 1986 eighty six uh... that uh... me and chris walking got an argument about politics um... there was another biography in two thousand eight called pieces of my heart

uh... i'm sorry this is the autobiography uh... that he himself wrote obviously probably some help uh... where he said it actually the fight was about my wife we were having an argument about her like you know forget about this career, you know, you had your day, you should just be mom now. We got these three girls. I've got this great acting career going. So let me do that. And Christopher Walkin was like,

no, she's Natalie Wood, man. Wait, wait, wait, wait. You got to do it as walking. Oh, Korea matters. Robert. That's great. That's great. That day tied for first with Sammy Davis Jr. Well, but it's also like probably one of the worst walkings because everyone does walk and then most of them are pretty great. I don't do walking.

I admire your walking. I'm just going to put it in. Give it a shot. Nothing. No. walk in, I admire your walk and I'm just going to put it in. Give it a shot, nothing. No. You know what happens when I actually try to do a voice. It goes south. Same here. So no matter how it shakes out, Wagner basically said,

you know, as far as what the fight was about, was that even though that is key, that he changed his story, because first it was about politics and it was personal. Yeah, that's a big change. It's a big change. But either way, he said Natalie, you know, was annoyed. She was put off by all this or she just got bored. She went to the master cabin and the last thing I saw of her was when I went to check on her and

she was doing her hair, the vanity, and basically shut the door on me. Right. Christopher Walken supported this. They were in an argument, Natalie Wood left, and then apparently according to Robert Wagner's autobiography, after Natalie Wood left, they continued their argument, and it got so heated that Robert Wagner smashed a wine bottle on the table. It's hard to do. If you're younger and you're like, this is bizarre behavior,

you need to take into account these people were ruinously drunk this night. They were as drunk as you can be and still be standing up and talking. That drunk. So that's why they were doing things like yelling about careers and smashing wine bottles on the table

and all sorts of other things that will come up. But the line throughout was that Natalie Wood went to bed. Christopher Walken and Robert Wagner eventually parted ways. Robert Wagner, I think went out to the bridge or outside. Christopher Walken went to bed and it wasn't for another hour or so that they noticed that Natalie Wood was gone and so is the dinghy. That's right. Natalie Wood's lawyer said after her death that she often took the dinghy out alone. Robert Wagner apparently as far as this initial story goes wasn't super worried because this is something that they say she was known to do.

But like you said she was known to do. But like you said, she was not a strong swimmer and there's an interview that has been played time and time again throughout all of this sort of trying to piece together what happened where not too long before a death where she said, I'm frightened to death of the water. I can swim a little bit, but I'm afraid of the water, I'm afraid of the water in the dark of water that is dark. So immediately there's a suspicion of like Why in the world would she have gone out there in this dinghy like sure she had had some drinks and was maybe drunk

Robert Wagner and that autobiography said well, that's exactly the point she went out there and Realized that oh wait. I am too drunk. I'm not a great swimmer. I'm scared of the water at night and They didn't hear the engine start up. So it again, it was just an accident That happened or or maybe she even you know couldn't get to sleep because this dinghy wasn't secured and it was banging against you know the the state room Near the state room. So she got out to do that to tie it up better and then slipped in. Right. Yeah, because when people were like, why would she go out into the dinghy if she was afraid of water, she didn't know how to drive the dinghy and she was wearing a night gout, he's like, well, it's probably it was banging and making noise, she was just trying to retry it. Those were

the two. That was his first one, people question it, that was the second one. The thing is, is throughout this all, the other witnesses supported what he was saying, including Christopher Walken. Apparently, the last time he talked about it was in 1997 in a Playboy magazine interview where he said that she slipped and fell in the water. And then one of the things that has never changed over the entire life of this story is that Christopher Walken was in bed when all of this happened asleep. No one ever changed that little nugget. Yeah, he has not talked about it much over the years. No, but when he has he's supported Robert Wagner's version. Yeah, but he didn't

write biographies and go into detail or anything like that. There are a couple of random interviews where he talks about it, but otherwise he is like to basically stay mom. Exactly. Talk about a terrible weekend on the boat as a guest, you know? Yeah, absolutely. So right off the bat, there are people that are like, this sounds pretty fishy. In 1992, there's like nine years later, Entertainment Weekly had a story.

You know, journalists kept following up over the years, basically. It's like, what's up with this story? Like, it's not adding up. There are certain things that just don't make any sense. Different people came out over the years that supposedly heard things. That was in the Entertainment Weekly story

that was about nearby the Capricorn with John Payne and Marilyn Wayne on board and they supposedly heard a woman yelling for help in the direction of the splendor for 15 minutes. Yeah, and that cashier, Vanity Fair article, they said that they thought it could have just been people goofing off like everyone's out there getting drunk and being loud probably. And it was hard to tell if it was real worried, you know, in panic, screaming, or people just having a good time.

But the last thing they said was they claim that they heard a man's slurred voice saying, okay, honey, we'll get you. Yeah. The thing is, is the cops never interviewed Wayne and Pain. They just were disincluded, I guess. As you'll see, this first investigation wrapped up pretty quick.

So it's not surprising that they weren't interviewed, but it is egregious they weren't. There's one other thing that Marilyn Wayne said. She said three days after Natalie Woods' death, she received a little message in scribbled handwriting saying, if you value your life, keep quiet about what you know. Which is not just a threat, it also is a very desperate act from a guilty conscience. If you do something like that, you are really worried about things because that's a really overextension of yourself in that case, just FYI, I guess.

Yeah. And if you picked your Chris for walking, saying it, it's bone chilling. Let's hear it. No, there's no way. That's too far. How about Sammy Davis, too, and you're doing it? That'd be kind of fun, actually Yeah, if you value your last babe Keep quiet about what you know, man So that's like I mean that's bombshell stuff, but Because it wasn't included in the police investigation. It's treated as conjecture rumor Maybe Marilyn Wayne is trying to get her 15 minutes of fame from what I could tell she was not like that at all She didn't seem to be prone to confabulation. She seemed like a reliable witness

She just wasn't she wasn't included in the original investigation But she was included in subsequent journalism and books on the subject. That's right From the beginning Lana Wood was someone who has sort of beat the drum of, hey, let's get this investigation going again. I'm not buying all this stuff. One of the biggest reasons why is because Dennis Dabber

and that ship captain, that yacht captain, his story really changed. At first, he went along with that official narrative like you were saying, like all three men did. But later on, in some of these were paid appearances, we should point out, he said, I was lying about some stuff in 1981. In that cash in her book in 2000, he said, this whole trip was not great. In fact, she didn't even spend the night on the boat the day before. She stayed on shore because there was so much kind of unpleasantness and fighting going on. And it stemmed from jealousy. Like, he didn't like, you know, this was her co-star in her new

movie that she was in. And he thought that they were flirting too much and that there might be something going on. And he was getting too much attention. Christopher Walken. And I didn't say the stuff back then. Yeah. He said that, I think on the today's show, they said, well, it's what, where you, you know, what did you tell the police? And he said, I, I told them the story that RJ came up with. Yeah.

So if you, there's another thing too, Dennis Davern is over the years, been very much accused of being like a publicity hound, trying, he's after the money or the, what, the, what, the, whatever, did write a book. But if you start to dig into him too and you watch some interviews with him, he genuinely seems uncomfortable. He doesn't seem like he's seeking the limelight. He does seem, I mean, at least at first glance, a person with a guilty conscience that's trying to come clean. And then, most importantly, I think he doesn't pain himself

in like this angelic light, like he lied to police. He went along with a conspiracy to cover up a murder potentially, like he's admitting his own culpability while he's revealing the truth. He's not trying to keep himself out of it that's a good point that's a very good point um... he also said uh... in this cashier book uh... the the yacht captain said after we got back from dinner on the twenty eight uh... they they were drunk they kept drinking

uh... and wagner was again still upset because upset because they were sort of giggling together, Natalie Wood and Chris Walken were. That's when the wine bottle got smashed and he yelled, what are you trying to do? F my wife. That's when, supposedly according to Davern, Wood went to her room and walk in went to his room. Because it's a party foul to smash your wine bottle on the table and say that to your guest. Yeah, it's a big party foul. Like the parties over at that point. Exactly.

They went to their separate rooms after a little while, according to davern, Robert Wagner went to Natalie Woods to their room and he heard them quote, fighting like crazy, things being thrown around. Then he said he heard the dinghy being untied. And in the Finstead book that just came out a few years ago, apparently the last words that Dennis Davern heard Wagner say were get off my effing boat. A lot of efforts from that guy that night. Yeah, that's not hard to heart.

So one other account that he gave of it was that there was this scuffle, a lot of physical sounds of fighting not just from the state room but now outside on the deck of the boat. Yeah. In earshot but out of eye sight. And he hears, get off my f-ing boat, a little more of a scuffle, and then silence. That's eerie. But it doesn't jive with Marilyn Wayne's ear witness account, which was that she heard somebody calling for help for 15 minutes. It's possible that Daverns telling what an accurate, he's portraying the story accurately, and that Marilyn Wayne really did hear somebody else goofing around. Who knows?

But those two, it's important that those two accounts, your witness accounts don't line up necessarily. So around 1130, according to Davern, Wagner came back to the bridge, was disheveled looking apparently, and they got drunk together, apparently on more than wine, right? Yeah, I think they moved to Scotch So at 130 in the morning Davern says that Wagner said he was gonna go check on her in her room Came back and said she was gone. That's when they noticed the dinghy was gone and he's like I got to turn on these lights and start looking According to Davern Wagner said, don't do that.

Don't turn on the engine. Don't do anything because we don't want to alert all these people. It's a very weird thing to say if your wife is missing off of a boat. Very weird. Even if you're ruinously drunk, that is a weird thing to say because also taken to account Dennis Davern is ruinously drunk at this time too. And his first instinct is to turn on the flood lights and start looking around the boat. So, Deverent said that this is all new. He's admitting

that he lied to the police at the time. He was interviewed twice by the police on the morning of at the boat and then a few days later in the presence of two of Robert Wagner's lawyers. And this is not what he told the the police this is all very new and scandalous stuff that he's basically pointing the finger at Robert Wagner without coming out and saying it overtly and he's saying that he lied to the police because he had a really unusual experience at the time he was fairly young i think he was in his 20s at the time. He was just some boat dude who they'd hired to be their captain and it'd become friends as close of friends as you can be with somebody you employer who employs you, right? But he kind of took them to

be friends. And so right after Natalie Wood died, he essentially moved in with Robert Wagner. Robert Wagner moved him into his house in Beverly Hills for a few weeks. And later on, Dennis Davern said it was akin to a hostage situation. Yeah, like according to Davern, it's like, let me get this guy in here and just let's keep him drunk and get drunk. And, you know, they're also, you know, drowning their sorrows and I imagine deeply upset. But yeah, like you said, he felt like he was not allowed to leave almost. Yeah, well, supposedly one of his girlfriend showed up to speak to him and was turned away at the door.

There wasn't a phone in the bedroom that he had. And at night when they turned on the security system, he couldn't leave the bedroom or also would set the security system off. So it's not like anybody was like, you stay here, but like security system, he couldn't leave the bedroom or also would set the security system off. So it's not like anybody was like, you stay here, but like you said, he didn't feel like he could leave. That's a very weird thing to say. But that is his explanation for why he didn't say this

and why he lied to police at first. That's right. I think now a break, yes? Yeah, let's do it. All right, we'll take a break and we'll be right back to talk about what's happened since then. [♪ Music playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing Today's episode is sponsored by Airbnb. Maybe you've stayed in an Airbnb before and thought to yourself, this actually seems pretty doable. Maybe your place could be an Airbnb.

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Listen to McCartney, a Life in lyrics on the iHeart Radio app Apple podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts. All right, we mentioned earlier that Devin wrote a book. It is called Good By Natalie, Good By Splinter. That was in 2009. In November of 2011, the LA Sheriff's Department reopened the investigation. And I remember this is very big news. Sand, we have some new information from some unnamed sources. Lanna, like I... lana had been beating the drum to kind of get this thing reopened for years uh... a publicist uh... for the Wagner family said

you know this is these are people trying to get their fifteen minutes they're trying to profit on the thirty year anniversary of the death uh... it's they didn't specifically mention daverns book but davern for his part, was like, man, my book's out of print at this point. No one's trying to sell a book here. Well, he also supposedly turned down a $50,000 offer from a tabloid to tell the story. Again, he didn't do it. So, yeah, he was apparently not out for the money.

Exactly. Well, you know, these are all accounts of people. So we can just report it, right? Yes, yes. I'm glad you said that because I don't want to give the impression that I'm like in Dennis Davern's corner. I'm just trying to give the full picture. I'm not trying to push him on anybody as a reliable person. That's not what I mean to be doing. So I'm glad you said that. Yeah. So, um, officials said that, uh, Wagner anden, like they're not suspects right now in 2011, Walken lawyered up immediately, though, which is interesting. And here's the rub. At this point, the statute of limitations had run out for anything but murder. So they couldn't go after him for assault or anything like that unless it was assault with

intent to murder her. And they're like, we don't have a case for that. We don't have new physical evidence. This story has changed. Daverin has admitted to lying. Unless we have some ironclad sort of figurative smoking smoking gun we can't go after robbert wagnar for you know for murdering natalie would right but at the same time robbert wagnar doesn't want this talked about any longer because whether he

did it or not it's his name and invariably is dragged through the mud now anytime the story comes up in the press especially now that the Sheriff's Department has reopened the case. So it couldn't have been very comfortable for him. Dennis Davan did the rounds. He was on today's show.

He was asked directly about lying to the police and admitted that he had. And apparently other people came forward too. Something like a hundred different people contacted the Sheriff's Department in Los Angeles, and one of the people that the detectives talked to, one of the lead investigators was named Ralph Hernandez. He was put together with the confidential source of Finstead, the biographer, who had done like years of research on this, And apparently Hernandez found the person credible enough that this kind of became an extra part of the case,

which was that this person had heard walk and say that Wagner and Wood had been fighting and that Wagner pushed Wood. Didn't say pushed him over, pushed her overboard, killed her, nothing like that, but it's enough that like it breaks or it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it,

it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it there was like yelling, crashing around, people on the boat arguing. Um, I, you know, I think it's basically agreed on at this point that everyone, you know, it was loud and there was arguing and there was fighting. I don't think anyone, I mean, even from the beginning, it was just like, yeah, we're arguing about politics, but that changed pretty quickly too. Uh, because there were so many ear witnesses basically. Yeah, but it's important to point out the Chuck is Wagner is never acknowledged that he

fought with wood. It was always a argument really between him and walking, maybe as far as it was about Wood's career. Right. But he's never said he was in an argument directly with wood, and especially that he didn't have any like throwing stuff around the room fight with Natalie Wood. So that's important to remember to his explanation is way back in the rear view now as far as we've gone with all of this, these different explanations.

Yeah, absolutely. So summer of 2012, the cause of death was formally changed to undetermined and drowning in other undetermined factors was the description of the accidental drowning. The LA County coroner said, you know, we have to explain this to the family. There has been a new analysis of these bruises. there's been a new analysis of these bruises. You know, there are some of them indicate that they were, you know, before she drowned, like they were from a fight, there were bruises on her wrist, that suggest assault happened, and like they had to tell their family this. Yeah, also there was another person named Vidal Herrera who took photos of Natalie Woods' body for the coroner's

office, and he said that he saw significant wounds on her head that were bad enough that she might have been unconscious before she even hit the water from the head wounds. That's a new piece of information. There was another new piece of information that came forward in 2020 who was someone else that worked at the coroner's office named Michael Franco, right? Yeah. So, and then again, this is from Finstead's book. Franco said that these friction burns and striations from the wrist and on her body were

in the opposite direction or what you would think you would get. She's trying to climb onto a boat. And there was bruising on her thighs, bruising on her shins. And to me, Chuck, to Franco, said to me it looked like it was someone who had been pushed and was in a physical altercation with another human. Yeah, and back in the day, in 1982, when he was an intern at the coroner's office, he went to chief examiner Thomas Naguchi and said all this stuff to him. And Naguchi apparently told Michael Franco that some things are better left unsaid and

that however it was written up, that's all you need to know. It's just a very weird thing for a chief medical examiner to say because they're the ones who are responsible for a determining cause of death. Yeah, absolutely. Where we stand today, as of about a year and a half ago in May 2022, the Sheriff's Department has ended the investigation, but it remains, quote, open, unsolved case. It's become a thing that is divided as family because on one side you have Lana Sort of beating the drum to keep this thing going and very suspicious of Robert Wagner and then you have that all the daughters

Have remained steadfast behind their dad. Yeah, they're like he loved her very very much things may have been volatile, but He did not kill her although L Lanna also says, like, I don't think he had some murderous intent. I think they were drunk and things got out of hand. Right. And he flew into a moment of rage that ended in her death, which is a different accusation than, you know, he was some abuse of husband and this was bound to happen or something. Right. Exactly. So she said this in a twenty twenty one memoir uh... that you mentioned

before it's called little sister colon my investigation into the mysterious death of natalie wood and she says that robber Wagner told her that after the funeral she's like what happened and and robber Wagner told her natalie wood sister that natalie probably taken the dinghy out to party hop and again she didn't know how to use the dinghy. She was afraid of the water, especially in the dark, and she was wearing a nightgown and socks and a coat, and that was it. So that didn't hold water.

I think that really kind of triggered a lot of Woods decades-long suspicion of this whole thing. So yeah, like you said, the family's been divided basically ever since. And the whole thing is still, it's an open case, it's unsolved, but they've exhausted all the leads that came out of the 2011 re-examination of it. So it's essentially back on the shelf for now. Yeah.

Pretty nuts, man. It is. It's a story that I think we will never know truly what happened. I, Wagnerson is 90s, unless there's some sort of deathbed confession from he or Chris walk in like it's going to go to their graves, I would imagine. I don't know, man. Because think about it, after Kirk Douglas, Lana would name him as the, as his sister's

rapist when she was 16. So I'm wondering if one of these people are going to say out here finally is the evidence that's about where Wagner totally killed Natalie wood and it now that he's dead i feel comfortable explaining how who knows i think it's a possibility but it would have to be a a recording of him saying that otherwise it would just be another person saying well he told me sure sure you know what i? Like the only three people that know what happened are Davern walking and Wagner. Right. And all walkin wants to do

is focus on cowbell. And dance. I would say probably the most important clue out of this whole thing though, Chuck, is that Robert Wagner and Dennis Davern switched a scotch on the bridge. is that Robert Wagner and Dennis Daverne switched to Scotch on the bridge. I said the one. Yeah, that's a power-drinking move late at night. For sure. I've seen it happen. Do you have anything else? I got nothing else. It's just tragic story. Yeah, that's the thing to remember. Yeah, you know, it's easy to get caught up in this Hollywood mystery, but there was a real human with a family that died. I hope people don't forget that and I hope we were respectful. Yeah, I think we were. That's a rule of thumb for all true crime stuff, you know? Absolutely.

Well, since Chuck said absolutely, I'm going to end on a high note for me and we'll go to listen to me. Hey guys, this is one from a long time ago actually that I forgot to read from Gareth. I was listening to the Diaries episode and thought you guys might like to hear about in gratitude lists because we were talking about gratitude lists. When I was working in mental health support we learned about them and the basic premise is sometimes your life is full of problems and you feel terrible. It's not always that helpful to be told to write down what you feel grateful for. And some people find it a bit like their problems aren't being taken seriously or being brushed under the rug.

So sometimes it can actually be helpful to write down everything that's wrong. Everything is hurting you or generally just ticking you off as a way to vent and hopefully understand why you feel, why you feel how you feel and possibly being able to process it and make a plan on how to change it. Nice. Yeah. Anyway, I thought we could be of interest to you

and potentially helpful to some listeners who have a lot going on to feel vindicated in their distress. And just to be clear, it's not about dwelling on the bed. It's mostly about just being able to say, yeah, fair play, me. I'm dealing with a lot. Nice. That's really awesome. And that is from, again, Gareth. Thanks a lot, Gareth. I would say Gareth is sitting in the best recent email chair for now, huh?

Yeah, that's a good one. Yeah, that was a very good one. Thanks for letting everybody know about that, because I'm sure there were some people out there that listened to that diary's episode and thought the very same thing. And now they're vindicated rather than dismissed. If you want to be like Gareth and try your shot at being in the best recent email chair, you can do that. Send it off to StuffPodcast at heartradio.com. Stuff you should know is a production of I Heart Radio. For more podcasts, my heart radio, visit the I Heart Radio app. Apple podcasts are wherever you listen to your favorite shows.

There's so much news happening around the world that we're somehow supposed to stay on top of. That's why we launched the Big Tick. It's a daily podcast from Bloomberg and I Heart Radio that turns down the volume a bit to give you some space to think. I'm Wes Kasova. Each weekday I dig into one important story and talk about why it matters. Listen to the Big Tick on the I Heart Radio app, Apple podcasts, or wherever you listen.

I'm Grace Campbell and on my new podcast, 28 Dates Later, I'm changing the narrative on how we find love. Join me on a wild adventure as I go on blind dates. Only picking people who are the total opposite of my type and after going on 28 of these dates in two months, will I find that special someone? It's time to find out. Listen to 28 dates later with me Grace Campbell on the I Heart Radio app, Apple Podcast, or wherever you get your podcasts.

Oseh County, Oklahoma, is getting a lot of attention right now because of Martin Scorsese's latest movie, Killers of the Flower Moon, about the 1920s Osage murders. I'm Rachel Adams-Herd, the host of Intrust. For over a year, I reported a different story about other ways white people got Osage land and well, and how a prominent ranching family became one of the biggest landowners here. Listen to the award-winning podcast

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