THROUGH THE LOOKING GLASS
Growing up in the shadow of her famously beautiful mother left Natasha Gregson Wagner questioning: how do you find your sense of self when you’ve always been defined by someone else?
Natasha Gregson Wagner grew up in the shadow of her beautiful mother, the actor Natalie Wood. Now it’s time for her to carve her own identity
MY MOTHER, NATALIE WOOD, WAS A FAMOUS ACTOR. Her first major role was in Miracle on 34th Street in 1947 when she was just eight years old. She was a teenager when she was nominated for Best Supporting Actress at the Oscars for playing opposite James Dean in Rebel Without A Cause. She died, in tragic circumstances, at age 43. I was just 11. As a teenager, people liked to remind me how stunning she was at my age. Whenever this happened, I would feel the familiar burn of shame tighten the back of my neck. I already knew that I was not as beautiful as my mother.
When I was little, we were often told how alike we were. Because she had been a child star, there was ample evidence. I’d seen her in films, of course, plus many black and white photos of her on Orson Welles’ lap, or in a director’s chair with her name on, which filled our Beverly Hills living room.
If I looked like my mother when she was my age, I reasoned, I would grow up to be just as beautiful as her. That was the message the adults seemed to be giving me. My mom confirmed this, smiling and nodding in agreement when people pointed out our similarities. ‘It’s true, Natooshie and I look exactly alike,’ she would coo in her most loving, reserved-just-for-me voice. I basked in her warm, pink light for 11 years. When I looked in the mirror, I liked what I saw. My tiny, turned-up nose looked just like my mom’s; my eyes were brown like hers, but a different shape. ‘More like an almond,’ my mother would say. ‘You have your father’s eyes.’ My biological dad, Richard Gregson, was British and lived in Wales. My parents divorced when I was nearly one and my mom remarried – the actor Robert Wagner (who I called Daddy Wagner). If having Daddy Gregson’s eyes was OK with her, it was OK with me.
One day, I was at my best friend Tracey’s house, high up in the Hollywood Hills. We had just come out of her mother Janis’ closet, all dressed up. Make-up was smeared across our faces. We were feeling fabulous in her sparkly high heels. ‘What’s up, fivehead?’ Tracey’s brother Steve asked me.
‘Shut up, Steve!’ Tracey retorted. Fivehead? Was he talking to me? ‘What’s a fivehead?’ I asked Tracey. ‘You know,’ Steve called after me. ‘A fivehead – bigger than a forehead.’
I asked my mom about this the next day. ‘Natasha, you have a very high forehead, which is a sign of great beauty.
“Now that my MOTHER has gone, whose face can I look at to recognise MY OWN?”
I have a high forehead also. Pay no attention to Steven,’ she reassured me. Whatever imperfections I may have had, one glance at my mom’s beautiful face, one quick conversation with her, eased my concerns. She was my mirror, my confidante, my security.
The day she drowned in an accident off the coast of Catalina Island, over the Thanksgiving weekend in 1981, my beauty seemed to die with her. No longer in the bubble of her unconditional acceptance, I felt lost. My teenage years were rocky. I bleached my hair blonde, trying to fit in with the surfer girls in Santa Monica. When that didn’t work, I dyed it jet black – my inner goth girl desperate to reveal herself. I cut my hair short; I grew it long. I experimented with blue and green eyeliner.
I overlined my lips. I painted my eyes dark brown. I was trying to find my ‘look’. I was searching for my face. In my early twenties, I began to find work as an actor, too. I was frequently cast as different versions of a lost waif. I was small and thin with tiny, unremarkable features. An actor’s face is a map for the audience, the emotion flickering across it signposting the character’s inner world.
In Hollywood, a woman’s face must be radiantly attractive. Would mine suffice? One day, I was perusing the shelves at Book Soup, the iconic bookstore on Sunset Boulevard, when an older man sidled up to me. ‘You got some moves, kid. You remind me of a young Natalie Wood. You know who she was?’ ‘Yes,’ I replied. ‘I know who she was.’ I blushed and walked away.
ANOTHER DAY, I WAS AT THE MARKET
near my apartment. It was hot out and I was wearing a white eyelet dress. An older lady with brown hair was looking at me. ‘I’m sorry to stare, but you look so much like my favourite actress, Natalie Wood. You’ve probably never heard of her, but she was so beautiful.’ I smiled at this nice lady. Yes, I do know who Natalie Wood was. I thanked her for the compliment and went on my way.
So, I did resemble my mom after all. I knew I didn’t look exactly like her. I don’t have the same deep brown velvet eyes, my face is pointier than hers, our smiles are different… but there is something about my face that evokes hers. And now, as I write this, I have turned 50. I am older than my mom ever got to be. I never saw her hair turn grey. I never saw her face tighten with wrinkles, her middle widen with menopause. How would she have handled ageing? Would she have shot potions and poisons into her face to slow the march of time? Dyed her grey strands brown? Would she have said to me, ‘Natooshie, look at the wrinkles around my eyes, what should I do about them?’ Now that she’s gone, whose face can I look at to recognise my own? To make sense of the thickened, sagging skin, the lines around my eyes, my furrowed brows?
My nine-year-old daughter, Clover, does not like it if I walk around the house in my sweatpants. She won’t tolerate me with unwashed hair. She’s happiest when my hair is clean and blow-dried, pink lipstick expertly applied. I felt the same way about my mom. When she had a lunch date with a friend, I would squeal with excitement, thinking I might be able to choose her outfit. I’d race to her wardrobe, with the masses of clothing hanging from the racks, pick out my favourite option – usually sky blue Chemin De Fer jeans, a bubblegum pink silk blouse, pale green espadrilles. I would hand them over hopefully, usually to be gently turned down.
I have a black and white photo of my mother and me that hangs in my house in Los Angeles, taken just after I was born. She is sitting in the passenger seat of my dad’s 1969 Mercedes Benz and smiling triumphantly. Her famous brown eyes are lined and mascaraed to perfection. Her hair is pulled back off her clean, clear face. She looks radiant. Her nails are painted and perfect. She is holding me securely in her arms. My eyes are open and I am staring at the camera. I have been alive for one or two days. In another photo, I lie in a hospital bed holding my newborn daughter. Daddy Wagner, his wife – my stepmother, Jill – and my husband Barry surround me. They are all smiling widely for the camera. I am smiling, too, but my face is puffy and my eyes are tired. I do not look radiant. I am not wearing make-up. In that moment, I was awed and humbled to have become a mother, but I was nowhere near the camera-ready perfection that my mom achieved in 1970. But by the time I became pregnant with Clover in 2011, I finally felt that I was pretty enough. I would never be the legendary beauty that my mother had been, and that was OK with me. My beauty is softer than my mother’s; less arresting, more accessible.
I spent time during my twenties and thirties mulling over my looks, comparing my face to my mother’s. I’d turn these thoughts over in my mind, like beads of sand slipping through my fingers. Where does my mom end and where do I begin? I don’t have my mom’s perfect face as a reflection or a way of understanding my own beauty as I grow older. Her perfect face was taken from me, but now I know: it’s time for me to stop living in the shadow of her perfection and embrace a beauty that is all my own. More Than Love: An Intimate Portrait of My Mother, Natalie Wood by Natasha Gregson Wagner is out 20 August