Natalie Wood Feared That She’d ‘End Up Like Marilyn Monroe’

Natalie Wood's secret diaries revealed her darkest fear — that she would meet the same tragic fate as Marilyn Monroe, suffering a lonely death under mysterious circumstances!

The "West Side Story" star — who mysteriously drowned on the night of November 29, 1981 — revealed her secrets in bombshell journal entries unearthed exclusively by The National ENQUIRER. "I had known [Marilyn] and seen her days before her death," wrote Natalie. "Her beauty, charming wit and joy of life seemed paradoxical to the intense loneliness she met in life."

“Her death," Natalie added, "the waste of her beauty, talent and worth as a human being had an enormous effect on me.” Tragically, Natalie would then go on to die in puzzling circumstances after a wild night with husband Robert Wagner and “Brainstorm” co-star Christopher Walken on the couple's yacht, Splendour.

Natalie’s sister, Lana Wood, shared the diary in hopes it could help detectives with their probe into her death. The star had even confided to her mother that she could “end up like Marilyn.” The diary entries also revealed Natalie’s heartbreak after getting caught in a love triangle with Elizabeth Taylor when she began dating Liz’s ex-husband Nicky Hilton.

“I met Nick a few years after his divorce from Elizabeth Taylor on a junket to Mexico City," wrote Natalie, here with Hilton and Zsa Zsa Gabor. "Nick had wanted to meet me…I was terrified of flying, and annoyed at the studio for making me go. But it turned out I had a fabulous time. For a while, Nick and I thought we loved each other. But we both had fiery tempers, and clashed often over insignificant things.”

Natalie writes of her own inner fears — in a touching confession that matches the troubled life of Marilyn herself: “When I think of my early years, it seems as if I spent most of that time auditioning. I was terribly insulated from the world outside the studio. So I didn’t know how to react to situations that seemed conventional to other children."

"The most important thing in my early years," added Natalie, "was to win the approval of others. It was only later that I learned that it was equally vital for me to develop self-esteem.” Natalie's diaries also showed how her fellow screen icon inspired the star to seek psychiatric help, writing: "One of the effects [of Marilyn's death] was that I again mobilized my resources to seek help in analysis."