Former Bond girl Lana Wood, sister of Natalie, reveals she is homeless
In the Sixties and Seventies, Lana Wood was a big star. She starred in the TV soap Peyton Place before becoming Bond Girl Plenty O’Toole opposite Sean Connery in Diamonds Are Forever. Her big sister Natalie, on the other hand, was Hollywood royalty, having shot to fame in Rebel Without a Cause and West Side Story and become a permanent fixture in the press.
But today Lana Wood is penniless living in a single motel room with five other members of her family. She spoke to Inside Edition, who visited Wood in her temporary home and learned what had happened to her to leave her in such dire straits.
The 71-year-old lives with her daughter, son-in-law and their three children. All six had been sharing the same rented house in Los Angeles but, after living there for seven years, they could no longer pay the rent and were forced to move out.
Wood’s daughter Evan has been suffering from Hodgkin’s Lymphoma, a form of cancer, and lung disease, which has left the family with mounting medical bills. Wood, too, needs to have two knee replacement surgeries.
Now they all live squashed into one room, sleeping across two double beds and a camp bed, that only has a fridge and a microwave.
“You live in a snow globe and the world is upside down, emotional,” Wood said. “It's like the rugs have been pulled out from under you. And it's just difficult to cope with.”
A rift between Wood and her sister’s children has left the family with nowhere to turn to for help.
Natalie Wood died in 1981, when she was 43, having drowned after an evening of drinking aboard her husband Robert Wagner’s yacht. The pair had been celebrating the end of filming the sci-fi thriller Brainstorm, along with Natalie’s co-star Christopher Walken.
But the exact circumstances surrounding her death remain mysterious. And since the boat's skipper Dennis Davern said in 2011 that he believed Wagner was responsible, Lana has demanded that Wagner speak again with police about what happened that night.
She even confronted him, on camera, at an event celebrating another former Bond girl, and Wagner’s current wife, Jill St John. Wagner, however, has always denied any involvement in Natalie’s death and the police do not consider him a suspect.
Lana’s strong feelings about her sister’s death has lead to estrangement from Natalie’s two children. But she says that if Natalie were alive today that she would be "devastated" and would "fix" Lana’s problems.
However, things might be looking up. A family friend has set up a Gofundme page on behalf of the Wood family, which has received over $23,000 (£17,800) in donations, so far.
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