#guy webster

The Doors, 1968

"I knew Natalie Wood long before she knew me. Let me explain. One day at Van Nuys High School in Los Angeles, me and some other guys, athletes, were in charge of admitting students into assembly. Now, I was kind of a punk in high school and completely unimpressed with celebrities and the movie business. Well, this one girl was late and she runs up to me and I won't let her in the auditorium. She begs but I won't budge and then she storms off. So my friend says 'don't you know who that is?', and I said no, I had no idea. It was Natalie Wood. The movie star. Our lives would cross paths again many years later. When Natalie decided to make a dramatic stretch in the films This Property Is Condemned and Inside Daisy Clover, she chose me, the unknown, to be her leading man. Since I was from the theater where character and craft are important, we clicked. I like to improvise, but Natalie didn't have much experience with that. But instead of behaving like some big movie star saying 'I can't do that' or 'I won't do that', Natalie went along with it. I had a wonderful time working with Natalie, not only because of her innate talent, but she also loved to laugh and joke around on the set, and we teased each other a lot. I'll always be thankful to Natalie for the things that she taught me. I adored Natalie Wood. She was incredibly generous, which not many people in our industry are. She was extremely driven and in charge when it came to her career. Yet Natalie had a vulnerability about her, I guess a part of her that longed to be taken care of. She didn't have a husband or a family when I first worked with her, and I think it was hard for her to be alone. Over the years we enjoyed a wonderful friendship. I was best man at her second wedding. A couple of years later Natalie even made a cameo appearance in the movie The Candidate as a favor to me. We eventually lost touch, but our admiration for each other never really ended. I only wish our paths could have crossed again. Oh, and at one point I told her the story about how I'd picked on her that day in high school. She got a big kick out of that." -Robert Redford. Remembering Natalie Wood... Born Natalie Zacharenko on July 20th, 1938 in San Francisco, California Died on November 29th, 1981 (age 43) off the coast of Catalina Island, California ❤