Inside Natalie Wood and Mart Crowley’s 20-Year Friendship

Wood and Crowley met on the set of ‘Splendor in the Grass’

When Wood and Crowley first met, she was eager to be acknowledged as a serious actor and had pegged her hopes on the lead role in the 1961 Elia Kazan-directed melodrama, Splendor in the Grass. As a production assistant on the film, some of Crowley’s daily tasks included assisting Wood, often accompanying her to the set. “Therefore we talked an awful lot,” Crowley says in the 2020 documentary Natalie Wood: What Remains Behind. What began as a working relationship quickly morphed into a trusted friendship and confidences were shared.

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