Natalie Wood, born Natalia Nikolaevna Zakharenko, also billed as Natasha Gurdin (July 20, 1938, San Francisco, California – November 29, 1981, Santa Catalina Island, California) was a three-time Academy Award nominated American film actress. Wood began appearing in movies when she was 5 years old, had parts in successful Hollywood films and unlike many child actors made the difficult transition Read more...

Wood successfully made the transition from child star to ingenue at age 16 when she co-starred in Nicholas Ray's Rebel Without a Cause with James Dean and Sal Mineo. Her performance won her an Oscar nomination for Best Supporting Actress. She followed this with a small but crucial role in John Ford's The Searchers opposite John Wayne. Her sister, Lana played her as a child in the film's earlier Read more...