Wood drowned in 1981 during a boat trip to Catalina Island in California. Clover is her only grandchild.

How Natalie Wood’s daughter Natasha Gregson Wagner ensures her own child feels ‘connection to her grandma’

Wood drowned in 1981 during a boat trip to Catalina Island in California. Clover is her only grandchild.

By Marina Watts

Marina Watts

Marina Watts is a news writer for with seven years experience covering entertainment, pop culture and celebrity news. Her previous work appears in PEOPLE, Bustle and Newsweek.

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May 29, 2026 3:05 p.m. ET

Natasha Gregson Wagner and daughter Clover Clementyne Watson; Natalie Wood

- Natasha Gregson Wagner is keeping her late mother's memory alive with her teenage daughter Clover, who is Wood's only grandchild.

- Wood died in 1981, drowning during a boat trip to Catalina Island in California. She was 43.

- An exhibit opening in Orange County this August includes a piano that had been passed down from Wood to Wagner, and to Clover.

Natasha Gregson Wagner is keeping her late mother's memory alive with her daughter.

Wagner, whose mother is the late actress Natalie Wood, told PEOPLE about how she wants 13-year-old Clover to be part of "this legacy that she will carry forward" ahead of an exhibition honoring Wood. The *Rebel Without a Cause** *actress died in November 1981, drowning during a boat trip to Catalina Island in California. Wagner was only 11 years old.

"I really want Clover to feel a connection to her grandma and I didn't know how I was going to do that when she was born, except that so many things from my mom's life and my life with my mom are in my home," Wagner said of mementos she's kept since childhood.

Wagner showed Clover the movies in which Wood appeared. "It did make sense that Clover would grow up around these things or around movies. There were lots of movies that she was able to watch as a child [from] when my mom was a child. And so, Clover's had a very Groundhog Day sort of childhood, very different from mine, very day in, day out."

Wood with Wagner in 1970.

Screen Archives/Getty

Wagner also mentioned the "legacy" that her daughter will carry forward as Wood's only grandchild. "What I'm trying to do is let Clover be the one to lead [with] how much she wants to step in and out of it."

So, Wagner wants her teenage daughter to make her own decisions on how much she wants to be involved with honoring Wood. "I'm trying to walk that line where I respect her boundaries, but I also want her to understand that her grandma was somebody to be celebrated," she explained.

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An exhibition at the Muckenthaler Cultural Center in Orange County opening in August called "More Than Love, the Life and Art of Natalie Wood," will feature dozens of her personal items including art, movie posters, and costumes. It also includes a musical instrument that had been in the family for generations.

"The green piano that she learned how to play piano on and then we learned how to play piano on, my daughter Clover then learned how to play piano on. That is in the exhibition. There's also this music box that my stepdad had bought her in England and I've always had it," she said.

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"Even though she was my mom, I like sharing her and I like for people to know that she was so much more than just an actress and a movie star. She was somebody who really put a lot of thought and intention into her personal life. And I think this exhibition reflects that very well."

Wagner and daughter Clover.

Natasha Gregson Wagner/Instagram

Wagner previously spoke about the similarities between her daughter and mother, along with Clover's interest in Wood. “She’s curious about my mom’s level of fame,” Wagner admitted to PEOPLE in September. “She’s aware of young people that are famous and she’ll say, ‘How famous was she?’ Like Justin and Hailey Bieber or something?’”

“She just got to see *Splendor in the Grass*," Wagner said of the 1961 drama movie starring her mother, "and that’s a pretty intense film, so she’s intrigued by the emotional spectrum of her performances."

“Clover is a very sensitive person. And I think she has that example in her grandma, being vulnerable but also such force.”

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