“Little Sister,” written by Lana Wood, will be released Tuesday, Variety reported. Lana Wood writes that Douglas, who died in February 2020 at age 103, assaulted her sister in the summer of 1955 when she was 17, according to The Associated Press.
According to Lana Wood, 75, the assault occurred after she and her mother, Maria Zakharenko, dropped Natalie Wood off at the Chateau Marmont in Los Angeles to meet with Douglas, the AP reported.
In a memoir being released on Tuesday called “Little Sister,” Lana Wood, Natalie Wood’s sister, writes that Kirk Douglas sexually assaulted Natalie when she was a teenager. https://t.co/r9MJHgTjOfpic.twitter.com/NGoFWv577V
Natalie Wood, born Natalia Nikolaevna Zakharenko on July 20, 1938, died under mysterious conditions when she drowned in the Pacific Ocean on Nov. 29, 1981. Natalie Wood’s body was found off Catalina Island in California. Authorities initially ruled her death an accidental drowning, but since then, her husband at the time, Robert Wagner, has been called a person of interest in the case, according to the AP.
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Photos: Natalie Wood through the years Here are some memorable moments from actress Natalie Wood's life and career. (Silver Screen Collection/Getty Images)
Photos: Natalie Wood through the years 1946: Eight-year-old Natalie Wood knits as she appears in court for judicial approval of her $1,000-a-week film contract on July 18, 1946. The young actress was discovered as she watched a movie being made on location near her home in Santa Rosa, California. (AP Photo/Los Angeles Times)
Photos: Natalie Wood through the years 1949: Actress Jane Wyatt fixes a hair ribbon for actress Natalie Wood in Hollywood, Calif., on Oct. 26, 1949. (AP Photo)
Photos: Natalie Wood through the years 1955: Actress Natalie Wood poses with her pet poodle, Fifi, at a Hollywood, Calif., studio on Oct. 28, 1955. (AP Photo)
Photos: Natalie Wood through the years 1956: Actor Tab Hunter, left, and actress Natalie Wood arrive at the 1955 annual Academy Awards presentations at the RKO Pantages Theatre in Hollywood, Calif., on March 21, 1956. (AP Photo)
Photos: Natalie Wood through the years 1957: Lance Reventlow, son of heiress Barbara Hutton, makes a public appearance March 27, 1957, in Hollywood, Los Angeles, by attending the Academy Awards presentations with actress Natalie Wood. (AP Photo)
Photos: Natalie Wood through the years 1958: Actors Robert Wagner and wife Natalie Wood arrive for the Hollywood premiere of "Some Came Running" in Hollywood on Dec. 18, 1958. (AP Photo)
Photos: Natalie Wood through the years 1959: Frank Sinatra, wearing a bandage and patch over the eye injured during filming of a movie battle scene, is pictured with actress Natalie Wood and her husband Robert Wagner at a party observing her 21st birthday and 17th year as a motion picture actress in Hollywood, Los Angeles, on Friday, July 19, 1959. (AP Photo)
Photos: Natalie Wood through the years 1961: Robert Wagner and wife Natalie Wood at academy party on June 20, 1961. Elizabeth Taylor is in background left. (AP Photo/DFS)
Photos: Natalie Wood through the years 1962: Actress Natalie Wood is shown arriving with actor Warren Beatty at the Academy Awards on April 9, 1962 in Santa Monica, California. (AP Photo)
Photos: Natalie Wood through the years 1963: Natalie Wood and Steve McQueen prepare for a scene in "Love with a Proper Stranger," a Paramount film being shot location, on March 22, 1963, in New York. (AP Photo/David Pickoff)
Photos: Natalie Wood through the years 1964: Luci Baines Johnson, younger daughter of President Johnson (left), and Indiana Sen. Birch Bayh arrive for Young Citizens for Johnson Texas-style barbecue at Beverly Hills on August 9, 1964. Welcoming them are co-sponsors actress Natalie Wood and actor Steve McQueen. (AP Photo/Harold Matosian)
Photos: Natalie Wood through the years 1969: Actress Natalie Wood and British film producer Richard Gregson are seen during their Russian Orthodox wedding ceremony at the Holy Virgin Mary Church in Hollywood, Calif., on May 30, 1969. (AP Photo)
Photos: Natalie Wood through the years 1972: In this April 23, 1972, file photo, actor Robert Wagner and his former wife, actress Natalie Wood, pose at the Dorchester Hotel in London. (AP File Photo)
Photos: Natalie Wood through the years 1974: In this photo provided by Good Housekeeping magazine, Natalie Wood and her husband, Robert Wagner, pose at home with their infant daughter, Courtney Wagner, in July 1974. (AP Photo/Good Housekeeping Magazine)
Photos: Natalie Wood through the years 1976: Robert Wagner with his wife, Natalie Wood, and Tennessee Williams (center) at an NBC party for the cast of "Cat on a Hot Tin Roof" on Nov. 19, 1976. (AP Photo/Ron Frehm)
Photos: Natalie Wood through the years 1977: British actor Sir Laurence Olivier with Robert Wagner and Natalie Wood pictured at a London press conference in 1977. (AP Photo)
Photos: Natalie Wood through the years 1978: In this April 3, 1978, file photo, Robert Wagner and Natalie Wood arrive at the 50th annual Academy Awards in Los Angeles. (AP Photo, File)
Photos: Natalie Wood through the years 1979: This Jan. 17, 1979, file photo, shows actress Natalie Wood. (AP Photo/File)
Photos: Natalie Wood through the years 1981: Natalie Wood is shown with co-star Christopher Walken on the set of "Brainstorm," the movie she was working on at the time of her death, on Oct. 15, 1981. (AP Photo/News & Observer)
Michael Douglas, the son of Kirk Douglas, did not respond to Variety’s request for comment. Michael Douglas, told the AP in a statement through his publicist: “May they both rest in peace.”
“I remember that Natalie looked especially beautiful when Mom and I dropped her off that night at the Chateau Marmont entrance,” Lana Wood writes in “Little Sister,” alleging that the incident happened around the time Natalie Wood was filming “The Searchers.” The meeting had been arranged by their mother. According to Lana Wood, her mother believed that “many doors might be thrown open for her, with just a nod of his famous, handsome head on her behalf,” the AP reported.
“It seemed like a long time passed before Natalie got back into the car and woke me up when she slammed the door shut,” Lana Wood writes in her book. “She looked awful. She was very disheveled and very upset, and she and Mom started urgently whispering to each other. I couldn’t really hear them or make out what they were saying. Something bad had apparently happened to my sister, but whatever it was, I was apparently too young to be told about it.”
According to Lana Wood, Natalie Wood did not discuss what happened until both were adults, the AP reported. Natalie Wood, after describing being brought into Douglas’ suite, told her sister, “And, uh ... he hurt me, Lana.”
In the biography, “Natalie Wood: The Complete Biography,” which was reissued in March 2020, Suzanne Finstad wrote about the actress being raped, without naming her assailant, Variety reported. Finstad refers to the rapist as one of Wood’s “childhood idols, a powerful, married movie star more than 20 years older than she.”
Kirk Douglas, in his late 30s at the time of the alleged assault, was known for such films as “Spartacus,” “The Bad and the Beautiful” and “Gunfight at the O.K. Corral,” according to Brittanica.
The 2020 HBO documentary “Natalie Wood: What Remains Behind” was produced by Natasha Gregson Wagner, the oldest of Natalie Wood’s three daughters, Variety reported. The show was critical of Lana Wood, asserting that she has exploited her sister’s death with sensational allegations about Natalie Wood’s fatal boating accident.
Kirk Douglas received a Life Achievement Award from the American Film Institute in 1991 and an honorary Academy Award in 1996, according to the website.
Douglas also received a Presidential Medal of Freedom in 1981 and the Legion of Honor from France in 1985, according to the AP.
