Lana Wood

Lana Wood Actress - Born March 1, 1946 in Santa Monica, California, USA

Birth Name Svetlana Lisa Gurdin

Height 5' 3" (1.6 m)

Mini Bio (1) Provocative and ever the temptress in her prime, the dark-maned, gorgeous Lana Wood was born Svetlana Lisa Gurdin in Santa Monica, California, the younger daughter of Nikolai Stephanovich Zakharenko and Maria Stepanovna Zudilov, émigrés of Ukrainian and Russian descent. Barely speaking comprehensible English, they subsequently changed the family name to Gurdin after becoming US citizens. Both her parents' families fled their Russian homeland following the Communist takeover and the couple met and married in San Francisco. Lana's more famous acting sister was christened Natalia eight years earlier and the third girl in the family was a half-sister named Olga, her mother's child.

Young Natalia (renamed Natalie Wood, out of respect to director Sam Wood) became a child star in the late 1940s, with such classics as Miracle on 34th Street (1947), and younger sis Lana would inevitably be drawn into films as a result of Natalie's overwhelming success. She made her "debut" as a baby in Natalie's "B" film Driftwood (1947) only to have her cute bit cut from the picture. Her first screen credit actually came with the John Ford classic The Searchers (1956) as a younger version of Natalie's character, and she was off and running.

In an effort to break away from her sister's looming shadow and find her own place in Hollywood, Lana set out to secure TV roles and did quite well on such popular programs as Playhouse 90 (1956), Have Gun - Will Travel (1957), Dr. Kildare (1961) and The Fugitive (1963), while continuing her minor appearances in such films as Marjorie Morningstar (1958) (again with Natalie), Five Finger Exercise (1962) and the The Girls on the Beach (1965).

In 1965 she earned a contract at Twentieth Century-Fox and was cast in her first television series, The Long, Hot Summer (1965), playing the Southern belle role Lee Remick had played in the 1958 film (The Long, Hot Summer (1958)). Better yet was her 1966 breakthrough role as hash-slinging waitress "Sandy Webber" on the original prime-time soap opera smash Peyton Place (1964), which she played for two seasons. Unlike the glamorous and refined Natalie, Lana developed an earthier "bad girl" persona. Her character femmes bore typical hard-luck stories--tarnished girls from the wrong side of the tracks who were often more trouble than they were worth. Off-screen, she married Peyton Place (1964) co-star Steve Oliver, who played her abusive husband and jailbird "Lee Webber." The marriage was annulled after one month.

After Peyton Place (1964), Lana continued to exude sex appeal in such films as For Singles Only (1968) and Scream Free! (1969), a drug tale that reunited Natalie's West Side Story (1961) co-stars Richard Beymer and Russ Tamblyn. She kept her name alive on TV as well, making the guest rounds on The Wild Wild West (1965), Bonanza (1959), The Felony Squad (1966) and Rowan & Martin's Laugh-In (1967).

In April 1971, Lana posed for Playboy in an attempt to gain added exposure. It worked. A major career boost presented itself in the form of producer Albert R. Broccoli (nicknamed "Cubby"), who caught the spread and offered her the role of Bondian femme fatale "Plenty O'Toole" in Diamonds Are Forever (1971) opposite Sean Connery. Following all this sexy publicity, Lana somehow nabbed an unexpected role in the Disney romp Justin Morgan Had a Horse (1972).

Although she stayed fairly active throughout the next decade or so with such TV movies as Black Water Gold (1970), QB VII (1974) and Nightmare in Badham County (1976), and the films Grayeagle (1977) and Satan's Mistress (1982), her star began to diminish.

Marriages during the 1970s included a union with actor/co-star Richard Smedley, whom she met on the set of A Place Called Today (1972). They produced her only child, daughter Evan, in 1974. She later married producer Allan Balter after meeting him during the filming of Captain America (1979). Six marriages would come and go before 1980.

In the mid-'80s she appeared for a time on the daytime soap opera Capitol (1982) but made a decision to move away from the acting arena after this period. Following the tragic drowning death of sister Natalie in 1981, Lana penned the controversial tell-all book "Natalie, A Memoir by Her Sister". What was meant as a candid, caring and cathartic expose on Lana's part was denounced by both critics and family alike as self-serving and hurtful. Later years included behind-the-camera work as a producer, which included co-producing the ABC-TV special The Mystery of Natalie Wood (2004). She also had her own casting company at one point.

After an extended absence, Lana was seen again on the screen into the millennium. Independent features include Deadly Renovations (2010), Donors (2014), Bestseller (2015), Killing Poe (2016), Subconscious Reality (2016), Wild Faith (2018) and The Marshal (2019).

A devoted animal lover, the still-stunning, five-times-married Lana occasionally appears at celebrity conventions and more recently returned to films and TV after nearly a two-decade absence.

- IMDb Mini Biography By: Gary Brumburgh / gr-home@pacbell.net

Allan Balter (20 October 1979 - 1980) ( divorced)

Richard Smedley (12 March 1972 - 1976) ( divorced) ( 1 child)

Dr. Stanley William Vogel (19 April 1968 - 14 October 1968) ( divorced)

Steve Oliver (26 February 1966 - 1966) ( annulled)

Karl Brent (17 April 1964 - 16 February 1965) ( divorced)

Jack Wrather Jr. (18 December 1962 - 10 January 1963) ( annulled)

Trade Mark (3) 1. Naturally large breasts 2. Arresting beauty 3. Open, unaffected personality

Aunt of Natasha Gregson Wagner and Courtney Wagner, and former sister-in-law of Richard Gregson and Robert Wagner. Wagner cut off contact with Lana after the drowning of Natalie Wood in 1981. The controversy of her sister's death has intensified since the 2012 official actions of the Los Angeles Coroner's Office in changing the manner of Natalie's death, on her death certificate, from "Accidental" to "Undetermined" because of the quantity and severity of the bruises described in the autopsy report. The investigation by the Los Angeles Sheriff's Department is ongoing.

Her paternal grandparents were Stephan Zakharenko and Eudoxie Sauchenko, and her maternal grandparents were Stepan Ilich Zudilov and Maria Andreevna Kuleva. She was of Ukrainian and Russian descent. Her father was an architect and her mother was a ballerina.

Her father changed the family's last name to Gurdin before she was born, which is why her sister Natalie Wood carried the original family last name Zackharenko at birth while Lana herself carried the new last name.

Mother of Evan Taylor Maldonado (August 11, 1974 - July 18, 2017) with former husband Richard Smedley. Evan had been married to Edward Maldonado since 1994 and they had three children: Nicholas (b. 1998), Daphne (b. 2000) and Max (b. 2005).

Best known for playing Bond girl Plenty O'Toole, the unfortunate casino gal who, half naked, gets thrown out of a hotel window and lands in a pool in Diamonds Are Forever (1971). She was 25 then.

Two of Lana's scenes as Plenty O'Toole in Diamonds Are Forever (1971) were deleted from the final film but are now available on DVD. The first scene is a deleted scene of Lana having dinner with Sean Connery. The second scene took place after Lana was thrown half naked into the pool; she returned to James Bond's apartment, soaking wet, wearing nothing but a white towel and to get the rest of her clothes and see what has become of Bond and sees him making love to Tiffany Case (Jill St. John). Before leaving, an agitated Lana took a card out of Tiffany's purse with her address on it; this second scene accounted for her death later in the film.

Said that she had to stand on a box during most of her scenes with Sean Connery in Diamonds Are Forever (1971) because even with high heels she was too short to fit into the camera frame with him.

In two of her films her character is prominently featured being sent out of a window. In The Searchers (1956), where she played the younger version of her older sister Natalie's character, she is sent out of a window and told to hide from the Indians who are coming to attack their range. In Diamonds Are Forever (1971) her character, Plenty O'Toole, is thrown half naked out of a hotel window to almost certain death (but survives by landing in the pool).

She and sister Natalie Wood have played the love interest of Richard Beymer: she as Karen opposite Richard's Dean in Scream Free! (1969) (aka Free Grass), and Natalie as Maria opposite Richard's Tony in West Side Story (1961).

In July 2007, she was a guest at the Western Film Fair in Charlotte, North Carolina along with Betty Lynn, Jacqueline Scott, Lynn Borden, Joyce Meadows, Brett Halsey, Rick Lenz and Robert Dix.

Lana Wood and her grandson, Max, were featured characters in Steve Alten's novel, "Meg: Hell's Aquarium". In the novel, Lana Wood was approached by an animal rights group called R.A.W. (Release of Animals to the Wild) to help facilitate the release of megalodons raised in captivity back into the ocean.

Attended the Motor City Comic Con in Novi, Michigan. [May 2009]

Producing film on Natalie's life for ABC. Filming in Australia. The movie is The Mystery of Natalie Wood (2004). [January 2003]

When Diamonds Are Forever (1971) aired on ABC the network had the scene where Lana, as Plenty O'Toole, walked around wearing nothing but a flimsy pair of see-through pink panties artificially altered to make it appear as though she were wearing a black bra with black panties.

Dated Dean Stockwell, Adam West, Eddie Fisher, Warren Beatty, Sean Connery, Alain Delon and Ryan O'Neal.

Turned down the Karen Black role in Easy Rider (1969).

Cohabited with Alan Feinstein for most of the 1980s.

Is a certified scuba diver.

Her daughter Evan passed away from heart failure at age 42. [July 2017]

Was blacklisted after Natalie's death.

She and her late sister Natalie Wood both had abortions. Lana had an abortion in 1963, by her own admission, and Natalie allegedly had an abortion in 1977, according to informed sources. Their mother Maria claimed to have had several abortions during the 1920s as well as a miscarriage in 1932.

She and Natalie had a maternal-half sister, Olga Viripaeff (1928-2015), who was born in Harbin, China as Ovsanna Tatuloff. Olga's father, Alexander Tatuloff (aka Alexei Tatulian; 1905-1971), was married to their mother from 1927 to 1935.

Born to Maria Zudilov (1908-1998) and Nikolai Zacharenko (1912-1980). Because it was considered stigmatic for a woman to marry a younger man, Maria lied about her age, claiming a 1912 birthdate on legal documents from the '30s on.

On Megyn Kelly Today (2017), when asked if she believes her sister was "murdered" by Robert Wagner, Wood said, "Yes.". [July 2018]

Cooperated with authors Suzanne Finstad and Marti Rulli for their sensational Natalie biographies.

Lana and her Satan's Mistress (1982) co-star, fellow former Bond girl Britt Ekland, share two ex-lovers in common: Ryan O'Neal and Warren Beatty.

1963 Deb star.

She got her role in Diamonds Are Forever (1971) after producers Albert R. Broccoli and Harry Saltzman saw her photos in a four-page layout in Playboy magazine.

[on being thrown half naked into the pool in Diamonds Are Forever (1971)] I was told that I was going to be thrown in basically naked, but they told me not to worry because they were going to be doing it in the middle of the night. And it's Las Vegas! Half the world's up in the middle of the night! There were all these people trying to get a look at me from their windows!

[on late sister Natalie Wood] I cry for her often. I expect I always will.

[on press reports that Natalie and Jill St. John were good friends] It drives me nuts. If anyone would know who Natalie's friends were, it would be me. Jill was never there. Not once!

What I really grieve for is what we could be now. I really need her now.

Robert Wagner maintains her death was an accident. How was she accidentally assaulted?

I think I was only divorced once, and the rest were annulments. Or, maybe not! I can't keep track actually, because it's not that important. I just am who I am.

Salary (1) Capitol (1982) $2,500 /week