That’s awful! Who could that man have been?
The skipper was either asleep or out cold the whole time. If he needs money he'll resurface and sell his story to a tabloid, but it's different each time. He's not taken seriously.
The rumors out of Hollywood at the time were that if anyone was guilty it was Walken. Natalie and RJ were storybook and fairy-tale. He was Jonathan Hart, the white hat, the "good guy."
There were rumors of some big argument between Walken and Wagner. Disgusted, Natalie attempted to go to ashore in her pajamas, hit her head and was knocked out.
There were also rumors that Walken had made advances to Natalie, and that he angrily tossed her in when she spurned him.
So I bought the book thinking that the evidence would surely implicate Walken. He's so cold-looking. Sinister.
Finstad describes how the three had been ashore at a restaraunt the night of the incident, and the author was able to interview witnesses of the dynamics between the party of three as well as of the liquor being consumed by all (a lot).
The reports were consistant. Any discord observed by patrons and restaraunt staff had little to do with Walken, it was between the Wagners, and it wasn't pretty.
Talk about the hangover from hell....
Another twist: Since Natalie had a bruise on her head, Noguchi speculated that she'd hit her head when she "slipped" and was knocked out, so she didn't know a thing. Since then however, several nautical Coast Guard-types have studied the tides and the ocean currents that were in place that night and concluded that it would not have been possible for Natalie to have been found where she was by just drifting there already dead. The only way for her to have gotten there was if she swam, and swam hard. They speculate that she must have held onto that dinghy and kicked and kicked for I-don't-remember-how-long, but well into the night.
The worst part? She almost made it. She was perhaps a few hundred feet from shore when she was overwhelmed or gave up.
If you're a Natalie Wood fan it's a great book and the most in depth detailed biography out there, but so creepy at the end. So many "what ifs," you keep wanting to rewrite the last chapters, but nothing can change that horrible ending.