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Sept. 20, 2023 - Dr. Oz Podcast
42:40
Natalie Wood's Boat Captain on the Fateful Night She Died | Dr. Oz | S11 | Ep 34 | Full Episode
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Time Text
What do you think happened to Natalie Wood that night on your boat?
I could hear her arguing.
Natalie, I told you!
Because her stateroom was right below the bridge deck.
I went down below and Robert opened the door.
Now there's a back door to their stateroom.
Robert Wagner was standing with his back against the back of the boat.
So I walked through the stateroom.
He looked at me and he says, Natalie's missing.
He says, go search the boat.
Coming up next.
Season 11 starts now.
Oh.
I became a doctor to help people heal.
Now I'm using the same science and medicine to take on true trauma.
It's never been clear what really happened to movie star Natalie Wood, one of the darkest unsolved Hollywood mysteries of all time.
The starlet's body was found floating in the Pacific Ocean, hours after a leisurely night on her yacht with her husband Robert Wagner, co-star Christopher Walken, and their boat captain, Dennis Davern.
It was considered a tragic accident, until last year when Robert Wagner was officially named a person of interest.
Now more witnesses have come forward.
We've been following the developments in the case, but today, Natalie Wood's boat captain, Dennis Davern, is speaking to us exclusively.
And what he has to say will make you rethink this whole case.
Take a look.
With doe-eyed innocence that evolved into smoldering sensuality, actress Natalie Wood made the leap from child star to ingenue and leading lady to international icon with ease.
Married, divorced, and remarried to actor Robert Wagner, the telegenic couple became one of Hollywood's most tumultuous duos, ending with Natalie's untimely and tragic death in 1981. Her last night alive was spent with Wagner on their yacht, with their guest, actor Christopher Walken.
Natalie, who was unable to swim and terrified of deep water, somehow went overboard.
Six hours later, her body, floating face down, was recovered a mile away.
She was 43 years old.
Her last moments on the yacht fueled rampant speculation and innuendo.
The Los Angeles County coroner's autopsy in 1981 would deem her death an accidental drowning, but note that her body was covered with bruises.
No charges had been filed, but the case was reopened in 2011 and Wood's death was reclassified to drowning and other undetermined factors.
The yacht's captain, Dennis Davern, reported hearing an explosive and alcohol-fueled fight between Wagner and Wood before her death.
And just last year, Robert Wagner was named a person of interest by investigators after two additional witnesses emerged that supported Davern's account.
Now, more than three decades later, will there finally be answers about Natalie Wood's untimely and tragic death?
Joining me now is prosecutor and host of Oxygen's Injustice with Nancy Grace.
Nancy Grace.
Also with us is investigative author Marty Rooley, who fought for decades to get Natalie Wood's case reopened.
I want to thank you both for being here.
Thank you.
Just to set the scene, there were three people, and only three people, on that boat that night that Natalie Wood died.
There was Natalie's husband, Robert Wagner, there was actor Christopher Walken, and the captain, Dennis DeBern.
And the stories differ.
Nancy, how has the public been dealing with Dennis Davern's claims to what happened to Natalie Wood?
You know, Oz, I've known Dennis Davern for a very long time.
And I've grilled him, grilled him as if I had him on cross-exam.
And I've got to tell you something, Oz, I believe him.
I believe him.
Has anybody here ever had a moment where you didn't say anything?
When something happened and you just didn't speak, I have.
And I'm ashamed of it.
I wish I had every single time.
Dennis Deverne has been vilified, dragged through the mud.
I think it's all unwarranted.
Remember, he's the one that's passed two polygraphs, not Wagner.
Him.
He's the one that was sent to go identify the body, Natalie Wood's body, not Wagner.
And he is the one that came forward with what happened that night.
I believe him and I hate the way he's been treated.
So the case was reopened in 2011. It was a new coroner that was assigned to the re-autopsy, the re-examination of Natalie's body that I think created some of this.
Remind us about these bruises.
Well, the bruises were overlooked in the first autopsy, and they came up with the theory that maybe Natalie had clung to the dinghy, and that's how she acquired the bruises, which made no sense.
It's a rubber dinghy, and when I saw the diagram of Natalie's body with the bruises marked in all the different positions, there was no doubt in my mind she was battered, but the ankle bruises That's what really got to me more than anything, because how would she have gotten them?
And they look like fingerprints.
And Dennis had just put non-skid on the deck.
So if she was dragged, that explained the facial operation, which was the most prominent bruise.
But she had big bruises, black and blues, all over her body.
She was beaten.
So in theory, someone would have held her by the ankles, pulled her along the deck.
And caused the upward facial abrasion and also left the fingerprint marks at her ankles.
There's no other explanation for those tiny, small, handprint-like bruises at Natalie's ankles.
Was there evidence that she was a battered woman?
Well, Robert Wagner himself accused her of having affairs with her, co-stars.
He always had jealousies, and there was always accused Natalie of not being emotionally faithful to him, as he calls it.
Just like a narcissist would say.
If people would study his words, which now, ironically, his autobiography And interviews become testimony because he will not cooperate with the new detectives on the case.
So what they do, they study everything he has said.
And there are so many inconsistencies with what he, how he describes.
Yes, Ms. Grace.
Not only that, listen, Dr. Oz, for nine years I worked at night at the Battered Women's Center while I was prosecuting during the day.
Natalie Wood Had a history of bruises all over her.
Unexplained bruises.
I have dealt with that so many times with battered women.
What happened?
Oh, I don't know.
I must have fallen.
Fallen?
Oz, what if Oz suddenly picked up that beaker right there and crashed it and had some kind of a fit?
That's what happened the night that she went overboard.
Her husband, Wagner, gets so angry, yells at Walken, are you trying to F my wife?
How humiliating for Natalie Wood.
Let me go show everyone what these bruises look like.
So, initially, Natalie's cause of death was determined to be, and I'm quoting it, accidental drowning.
But a closer look at the bruises all over her body paints a very different picture.
Natalie sustained bruising on her forehead and her cheek.
Those are some of the scrape marks that were mentioned earlier.
I mean, it was all over her body, right?
And then there were numerous bruises to the back of her legs as well.
My team actually counted all these spots that you can see I'm putting in front of you here, and it totals at least 11 bruises to the back of her legs.
11, right?
And 28 bruises to the front of her body.
Another significant detail is that her bladder was full.
Now, the theory was that if Natalie was fearfully drowning, right, then her fight or flight would have kicked in like for any of us it would have kicked in.
That would cause you to release your urine, emptying your bladder, right?
You know that's common.
When people are scared, they'll pee on themselves.
That's natural.
It's supposed to happen.
But if she was already unconscious when she went into the water, wouldn't have had that fight-or-flight response.
Her bladder wouldn't have emptied by itself.
The details of this autopsy are unnerving to me.
We're gonna hear from the man who was actually there the night Natalie sustained all these bruises.
Up next, boat captain Dennis Deverne is backstage right now.
He's waiting for us with exclusive details of what he said really happened on the boat that night.
More on that when we come back.
Now we're in the main salon.
Christopher sits here.
Natalie sits here.
Robert, he's standing up.
All of a sudden, he picked up that bottle of wine.
He smashed it on the table.
He said, what are you trying to do?
F my wife?
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That's coming up tomorrow.
We're back discussing how Hollywood actress Natalie Wood met a tragic fate after a fateful voyage sent her overboard in the Pacific Ocean.
Her death was labeled an accidental drowning in 1981, but later changed to drowning and other undetermined factors decades later.
Joining me now in an exclusive interview is Natalie's friend and the boat captain, Dennis DeVern.
Thank you for being here.
Thank you, Dr. Ross.
I know this is difficult to revisit.
I appreciate your honesty and candor.
How did you first meet Natalie Wood?
Well, I first met Natalie Wood in Marina Del Rey, California.
I was working on the boat that was for sale, and they had come down to the dock to look at a boat to buy.
And when they ended up buying the boat, that's how I first met the Wagners.
Was Robert Wagner ever jealous of your friendship with his wife?
No, Robert Wagner, we all gained a friendship immediately and trust.
And I think that's, you know, why I was with them for such a long period of time.
We all just became really, really close friends.
And with the friendship, you know, you have the trust.
You were able to witness Natalie and Robert Wagner in their married life.
Describe it for me.
Well, I never really saw them affectionate, but they would laugh and joke with each other.
But I really never saw, like, hug and kiss and stuff like that.
You could tell that they were very happy.
So take us to that evening where Natalie disappeared off the boat.
What led up to it?
As best as you can recount, give us some of the details of where things went wrong.
So we're having this nice dinner, and we're drinking wine, and everybody's having a good time.
You know, I mean, we're joking and laughing, having a great time.
And then all of a sudden, Robert Wagner, he says, let's go back to the boat now.
So you're back on the boat.
You set up the deck.
I set up, you know, now we're in the main salon, which is kind of like a living room in a house.
And Christopher sits here.
Natalie sits here.
Here's the coffee table.
Robert, he's standing up and I'm in the galley, which is right there.
And all of a sudden he picked up that bottle of wine like this.
He smashed it on the table.
He said, what are you trying to do?
F my wife?
They're both yelling, plus you could hear things being thrown about in the cabin.
It was a full-on physical fight that was going on down there.
So I went down below, and I knocked on the door.
RJ opened the door about this wide.
He said, go away.
We're back in an exclusive interview with Natalie Wood's friend and boat captain, Dennis DeVerm.
Now, he's here reliving the tragic events that unfolded on the night she died.
Natalie Wood, Robert Wagner, Christopher Walken, and Dennis had just returned to the boat after having dinner on Catalina Island.
Okay, so you're on the boat.
Set up what happened on the deck.
I set up, you know, now we're in the main salon, which is kind of like a living room in a house.
Robert all of a sudden picked up that bottle of wine like this.
He smashed it on the table.
He said, what are you trying to do?
F my wife?
I'll tell you what.
The feeling...
It was just amazing.
It was just incredible what the feeling went through me.
It's like, oh my God, I can't believe this is happening.
And within that instant...
Christopher went to his stateroom.
He got up because he was so devastated.
He didn't know what to do.
So he went to his stateroom and Natalie, she stood up and she says, I can't stand for this.
And she rushed off down to her stateroom.
And I thought, well, now here's me and Robert.
And I thought, well, I'm going to go up on the bridge.
That's the next level of the boat up.
And he went down below.
So I'm up on the bridge.
Christopher's in his stateroom.
And I could hear you arguing.
Because their stateroom was right below the bridge deck.
And the arguing was so intense that I thought...
Maybe I'll turn the music up a little bit.
Because I didn't want them to think that I was eavesdropping.
With that kind of loud arguing, though, you would have heard something.
Was it him yelling at her, her yelling at him?
It was both.
They were both yelling, plus you could hear things being thrown about in the cabin.
I mean, it was a full-on physical fight that was going on down there.
I started to get so concerned.
I said, you know what?
I hate to interfere, but I have to go knock on this door.
So I went down below and I knocked on the door and R.J. opened the door about this wide and he said, go away.
I thought, well, gotta go away.
This man means business.
So I went back up on the bridge.
You didn't hear Natalie when you opened the door?
No.
So I went back up on the bridge.
And then all of a sudden everything was quiet and I thought, I think I'm just gonna go down and just check.
I went down, I opened the stateroom door.
Now there's a back door to their stateroom.
It's like a double door.
And on beyond that double door is the aft deck of the boat.
So that's the back of the boat and then there's a dinghy tied up on the swim platform to the boat.
And when I opened the door, the double doors were open and Robert Wagner was standing with his back against the back of the boat.
He was just standing there.
So I walked through the stateroom and I said...
I didn't say anything.
He looked at me and he says, Natalie's missing.
He says, go search the boat.
Well, I thought...
The boat isn't that big, but I thought with me being up on the bridge, there could have been a possibility that she went all the way forward to my stateroom because the night before, there was an argument, and her and I spent the night in a hotel in Avalon together, alone.
So I figured that maybe she felt safe and went to my room.
So the first thing I did, I went up to that room, my room, and I checked.
It was empty.
I looked, and there's another stateroom, another guest stateroom, empty.
I opened.
I thought, well, I'll open Christopher's door just to be on the safe side.
I opened his door.
You could see, you know, the beds weren't that big.
He was there alone.
So my heart starts racing, and I went back to Robert Wagner, and I said, she's not here, and he says, the dinghy's gone.
I said, well, we need to turn on the searchlight, see if we can see her, and let's get on the radio and call somebody.
And he says, no, we're not going to do that.
I think to myself, what do you mean we're not going to do that?
It's your wife.
She's gone.
She's deathly afraid of water.
You know, none of this is making any sense.
You know, we've all been drinking, but, you know, I mean, all of a sudden, you know, you're thinking, this is not right.
And a long, long period of time went by.
Five minutes, 50 minutes.
Oh, longer than that.
Hours.
Hours.
And after all this time's gone by, then he decided, well...
Maybe I'll call the restaurant to see if she went to the restaurant.
She didn't even know how to drive the dinghy.
She doesn't even know how to untie the dinghy.
It was Thanksgiving weekend.
It was freezing cold.
It was rainy.
It was windy.
It wasn't a very pleasant weekend to be boating.
When Robert Wagner said, don't call the police about my missing wife.
Don't turn the spotlights on about my missing wife.
Did you offer him advice to the contrary?
Did you ask him why?
All I said is we really should.
Because I was in a position, I was like in my 20s, you know, so it was like, you know, here's this big movie star and all this kind of stuff, you know, the way you sometimes when you're younger.
I felt that he was in command and I really didn't have...
Anything, I felt like I didn't have anything I could do about it.
And then I also start to fear, feel fearful for my own life.
Because I'm thinking, to me this whole thing didn't make sense.
And I was thinking to myself, I wonder if he might be thinking, maybe I should get rid of him.
I want to know where she's at.
He doesn't.
When you walked through the room before you found Robert Wagner, when the room became silent, what did it look like?
It looked like a storm went through that room.
Everything was just all over the place.
It was a mess.
Found one of her earrings.
It was...
Thrown somewhere in the corner of the room.
I mean, literally, I don't know if it was ripped off her ear or what, but I mean, there was an earring.
The pillows were all over.
I mean, the room was a mess.
There was a full-on fight in that room.
What was Christopher Walken's response when he found out that Natalie was missing?
He didn't say a word.
He just cried.
He cried.
Christopher Walken cried.
Well, yeah, I mean, he was, like, he was so devastated standing there.
Here's all the authorities.
This is all on the back of the boat.
He was, like, full of tears.
Just couldn't believe it.
You know, I mean, it's just unbelievable.
He claims that he was asleep while this all happened.
He claims he was asleep.
You know, he may not have been, but I think that if he wasn't, he probably thought it's better that he doesn't interfere because who knows what it could turn out to be.
Okay.
Up next, how was it possible that on such a small yacht, no one, no one knew how Natalie disappeared?
We're recreating the scene from that night and exploring how she might have ended up in the water based on her autopsy and Dennis's eyewitness account The texting suicide case The victim's family speaks out about Michelle Carter's early release from jail.
That's coming up on Thursday.
We are back discussing how Hollywood actress Natalie Wood made a tragic end after a fatal voyage sent her overboard in the Pacific Ocean.
Her death was labeled an accidental drowning in 1981, but later changed to drowning and other undetermined factors decades later.
Let's head over to our tiny crime lab.
Joining me is investigative author Marty Rulli, who fought for decades to get Natalie Wood's case reopened.
Thank you for being here.
So as we've discussed, there were four people and only four people on the boat that night.
There was Natalie, right?
Natalie Wood here.
Christopher Walken.
R.J. Wagner.
And then Dennis Davern, the captain of the boat.
So that's the layout here.
And I'm going to applaud our team for building this out so it's easier for you as well.
So start off with the evening begins for us.
They've come back from dinner.
They're sitting here in the main central cabin area.
Natalie's here.
Give us Dennis Davern's accounts of what happened that night.
All four were in the main salon and they were going to cap off the night with a glass of wine.
Dennis was in the galley and opened a bottle of wine and placed it on the coffee table.
Natalie and Christopher were sitting on this sette and chatting and Robert Wagner was glaring at them.
His anger and the tension was building, and Dennis noticed it.
Suddenly, Wagner picked up the bottle of wine, smashed it on the coffee table as hard as he could, glass shattered everywhere, and everyone was stunned.
Everything went quiet.
Christopher...
So Wagner's come over here, he's broken the glass.
Yes.
These two are talking about their movie, was seemingly intimate, got Wagner jealous.
Yes.
What happens to Christopher Walken?
Christopher went pretty much immediately to his far forward cabin, and he stayed there for the rest of the night.
Okay, so he's lying in bed there.
Yes.
What happens with Natalie?
Natalie was mortified.
She told her husband she won't tolerate that type of behavior, and she took three steps down to the master state room.
So she's down in here.
It says she's over by her bed.
Yes, she started to get ready for bed.
Okay.
What does Robert Wagner do?
Robert Wagner hung his head and Dennis told him, you should go apologize to Natalie.
So Robert Wagner also went to the master stateroom and the arguing started.
Now, Dennis is over here in the galley, but he's able to hear what's happening.
He heard what was happening, and it was a loud and scary fight.
They were screaming at each other.
So Dennis knocked on the stateroom door.
Wagner went and opened the door and wedged himself between the door and told Dennis, go away, mind your own business, and leave us alone.
So Dennis stepped back and the arguing continued.
But now Dennis was hearing things being thrown around the stateroom and maybe as a body being slammed against the wall.
And then the argument broke out to the rear deck.
Dennis is now on the deck.
Yes, he's up on the bridge, and he turned on music to try to drown them out so other boaters would not hear them.
But when everything went silent, Dennis went below again, came down and looked out the door, and Natalie was gone.
And he sees Robert Wagner, who's disheveled and nervous and sweating, and Wagner tells Dennis, Natalie is gone.
Natalie is missing.
Dennis...
Wagner says, search the boat for Natalie.
So Dennis goes through the boat, and he hopes to see Natalie in his far forward cabin.
Natalie was not there.
And he did check on Christopher Walken, who seemed to be sleeping in his cabin.
So Dennis meets back up with Robert Wagner, and Wagner tells Dennis the dinghy is missing.
So...
Now this dinghy, when Dennis came the first time, we don't know if the dinghy was there or not.
Exactly.
Dennis could not see that because it was down a little low, flush with the swim step.
Wagner had argued that the dinghy was actually on the side.
Through the years, the infamous explanation for Natalie's death is that the dinghy was tied port, banging against the headboard here, and disturbing her sleep, so she went out to adjust the dinghy.
And fell overboard.
And fell overboard.
So she's trying to fix this and she can't swim.
And Dennis argues that the boat wasn't back there.
Dennis had tied the dinghy flush with the swim step to two cleats about 12 feet apart.
And that's where Dennis tied the dinghy that night before he joined them in the main salon.
So that was all just an explanation to cover why Natalie wasn't on the boat.
The dinghy was not tied port.
So potentially when he went back, To go find what was else happening on the boat.
Good time to let the dinghy go.
And this goes away.
Yeah.
And Natalie, we don't know.
In, out.
In, out.
But not anywhere.
So when Dennis comes back, he sees only this.
He sees only RJ. So are the investigators taking this seriously now?
Oh, definitely.
They named him a person of interest, Robert Wagner, just last year.
Is there a possibility they could prove that Natalie's death was a homicide?
Yes, there's plenty of circumstantial evidence, as just demonstrated here.
There's medical evidence that can't be denied.
And then there's witness accounts.
It's not only Dennis's polygraph tests now that he passed.
Two other witnesses, since the case was reopened, have come forward, and they corroborate Dennis's story.
So yes, this could make it to a courtroom.
Marty, thank you very much.
Okay, thank you.
We'll be right back.
Okay.
You were told to go identify the body.
What did she look like when you saw her?
She was bruised.
Badly bruised.
I couldn't bear to look too long.
What do you think happened to Natalie Wood that night?
We're back continuing our exclusive interview with Natalie Wood's friend and boat captain Dennis Deverne.
His life would change forever after one fatal voyage sent Natalie overboard in the Pacific Ocean.
He's here discussing the painful events after her mysterious death.
So, after Natalie's body was found, you were told to go identify the body.
Why?
Well, they asked Robert Wagner, they said, you know, before this helicopter takes you and Christopher off the island, back to your house in Beverly Hills, we need you to identify your wife.
He said, I'm sorry, I can't do that.
We'll get Dennis to do that.
So I was elected to do that.
And then later on, my transportation was provided to go back to the house in Beverly Hills after I identified her body.
What did she look like when you saw her?
She had a lot of bruises on her.
I didn't take a whole lot of time to really, really look.
I mean, just to see her face was enough.
But she was bruised, badly bruised.
I couldn't bear to look too long.
What do you think happened to Natalie Wood that night on your boat?
I think when Robert Wagner was in that jealous rage and the fight was going on down below, I think that probably she was knocked unconscious and not pushed overboard, but placed overboard or dumped overboard.
That's what I think happened.
I mean, there's no other thing, you know, when you look at everything that happened.
Plus, I don't even think there was any water in her lungs.
You know, so I think that discounts the drowning.
You identified Natalie Wood's body.
I understand the trauma that would...
Great.
You're then taken back, I gather, to Robert Wagner's home.
What happened when you got back there?
As soon as I got to Robert Wagner's home, they said, you have to go upstairs to Robert Wagner's bedroom.
I went up there and Robert Wagner's lawyer's standing there.
Robert Wagner's in the bed.
They said, okay, here's the story.
Natalie went out to untie the boat because it was it was the dinghy because it was banging up against the boat and she was going to re-secure it and she must have had slipped into the water and drowned and this is the story this is what happened Dennis and Christopher is going to be told the same story and we all have to stick to this story and tomorrow you'll be assigned a lawyer And
that's the story.
Why did you decide to follow that storyline?
I just decided to follow that because I was young and I was scared.
I'm thinking to myself, these guys are like way, way Bigger than me.
And if I started to create something, it might not be good.
So I thought, maybe I should just go ahead and do what they say.
Were you able to come and go from the house as you wished?
No.
I was at their house probably for up to a year.
And my life was just horrible.
I couldn't leave the house whenever I wanted.
I would have to...
Well, that was totally out of the question, because for the longest time, the paparazzi would be in front of their house, and there were bodyguards at the front door.
And at one time, I said, you know, I have a girlfriend that I'd like to visit.
And...
They said, okay, well, the driver and the bodyguard took me to my girlfriend's house that maybe lived a half an hour away.
And I was in my girlfriend's house and all of a sudden a knock came to the door.
And I'd only been there maybe not even an hour.
And they said, come on, Dennis, it's time to go.
I said, well, you know, I'm just kind of hanging out with my girlfriend.
They said, it's time to go.
The bodyguard grabbed me by my neck.
Says, you're going now.
Opened the door to the limousine.
Throws me in the back.
I said, man, this is not good.
And back to the house.
And actually, my bedroom door, you know, they had an alarm system on the house, but the bedroom door had some type of, seemed like some type of like a magnetic lock.
To where the door felt like solid, you know, you couldn't rattle the door if it was locked.
It was just a solid door.
And that went on for so long.
How did you finally get out of the house for good?
Well, after the year had gone by, you know, I said, I think I want to go back to New Jersey where I'm from.
And at that point, I left.
I was free.
Did Robert Wagner say anything to you?
Not a word.
Never said a word to him ever since then, ever.
All these years?
All these years.
You didn't come forward for many years.
Did Robert Wagner or anyone who worked with him ever threaten you?
I was threatened two times.
I was threatened one time I remembered so clearly.
The guy says, I know who he is.
He says, you better keep your mouth shut or else.
And I'm saying to myself, this is way, way too scary for me, and plus one other time.
I don't know who that person was, but the person that I did know when he said that, he was serious.
Dennis, do you have any fear as we sit right here in the studio?
Nancy, what can the law do now?
This man has passed two polygraphs that if he, DeVarne, went to a grand jury, a grand jury would take action.
It's not too late.
We're back in an exclusive interview with Dennis DeVern, Natalie Wood's friend and boat captain.
Dennis was one of the last people to have seen her alive before she mysteriously went overboard on her yacht.
Many have suspected foul play at the hands of her famous husband, Robert Wagner.
So investigators are taking one last shot at solving Natalie's mysterious death.
Rejoining us are Nancy Grace and Marty Rulli, who Dennis just spoke about.
Marty, why did it take so long for police to...
To consider Robert Wagner a suspect, or at least to publicly announce that he was a potential suspect.
His celebrity.
They did not want to hear anything different than what had been decided right after Natalie's funeral.
Nancy, what can the law do now?
It's been a long time.
We're losing witnesses.
It's not over yet.
Here's a big problem.
So much time has passed, it's hard to put together A prosecution or a case this many years later.
You got Robert Wagner.
He's got one foot in the grave and the other foot on a banana peel.
Does that mean they should not seek justice?
No.
Lady Justice never ages, Dr. Oz.
And there is no statute of limitations on murder, even if it's a voluntary manslaughter in the heat of an argument.
But what you have to do first is get a timeline, and that includes getting Christopher Walken, as much as he stayed out of it, back in it.
Get with Davern and establish a timeline, including the night before when Natalie Wood was so upset about her husband's jealous rages, she left the boat and spent the night in a hotel to get away.
This man has passed two hours.
Polygraphs.
And I believe, Oz, with all my heart, that if he, DeVern, went to a grand jury, a grand jury would take action.
It's not too late.
And I think the cops originally on the case just don't want to admit they were wrong.
You agree with what Nancy said?
I agree with Nancy 100%.
I spent almost eight hours in an interview room with the Los Angeles Sheriff, two homicide detectives.
And after the interview, they said to me, would you be willing to take a lie detector, a polygraph test?
I said, absolutely.
Well, I didn't think they meant it literally right then, but within that second, the detective put his hand on the doorknob and opened it, and there's a Los Angeles Sheriff's Department polygraphed examiner standing there.
He says, just come right this way.
I said, okay.
So then I took the polygraph.
They came back and they said, everything that you told us, same as I'm pretty much telling you, you passed this test with flying colors.
Unfortunately, a polygraph doesn't hold up.
It's not a Have it in court.
What you're saying may still hold up independent because of how you're saying it.
What do you miss the most about Natalie Wood?
All the nice times we had, you know, when we'd be in Catalina, I don't like cold water.
I like water to swim in like 80, 85 degrees.
Natalie was deathly afraid of water.
And by the way, the water there is normally like 68 degrees or something like that, way too cold.
And Natalie was deathly afraid of water.
I mean, she wouldn't put her toes in the water.
So it gave her and I a whole lot of time to be on the bridge of the boat while RJ and the kids were swimming or he'd be fishing.
They were more into the water sports with the jet ski and all that kind of stuff.
Where me and Natalie, we would talk.
We would talk.
We'd talk like, I'd tell her, oh, I'm having a problem with my girlfriend.
And she'd say, well, you know, you should do this, you know, do that.
And then she'd say, oh, you know, with this movie I'm doing, she says, Dennis, you have to come to the set.
They're doing this big, huge mudslide.
It's all this mud's going to come down on me and all this, you know, and it was perfect.
I mean, we just had a real nice relationship.
We'll be right back.
What was your reaction to Robert Wagner being labeled a personal interest?
I wish they could have done that a long, long time ago.
Back in those days, you know, if you were a celebrity and you did something wrong, they could smooth it over.
What do you want Robert Wagner We're back in an exclusive interview with Natalie Wood's friend and boat captain Dennis DeVern, who was there on the night the actress mysteriously went overboard into the Pacific Ocean.
Dennis claims her death was no accident.
And now that Robert Wagner has been labeled a person of interest, Dennis wants answers.
What was your reaction to Mr. Wagner being named the person of interest last year?
I wish they could have done that a long, long time ago.
You know, I wish they could have...
Labeled him a person of interest and been able to carry on this investigation sooner rather than just smoothing things over.
Back in those days, you know, if you were a celebrity and you did something wrong, they could smooth it over.
It's so, you know, hey, it's so-and-so, you know.
I mean, if it was the guy walking down the street, he'd be in jail.
But then it was different.
Then things started changing.
When celebrities would do something wrong, the law would take it serious and say, hey, you know what?
You did something wrong.
You're going to have to go to prison.
What would you say to him if he was sitting where I am right now?
I'd say, why don't you just man up and say what really happened.
You know, be a man.
You know, we all make mistakes.
You know, what you did is so wrong and you're so, you know, you just can't admit it.
You know, how can you live with yourself?
You know, you're not the big man that you really think when you do something like that.
I thank you for coming on the show.
Dr. Oz, thank you too.
Thank you.
We reached after Robert Wagner's attorney several times throughout our tapings on Natalie Wood's death, including the allegations made here today, but he has never gotten back to us.
However, in 2013, two years after the case was reopened, his attorney said in part, Mr. Wagner has fully cooperated over the last 30 years in the investigation of the accidental drowning of his wife in 1981. Mr. Wagner has been interviewed on multiple occasions by the Los Angeles Sheriff's Department and answered every single question asked of him by detectives during those interviews.
It's important to remember That Robert Wagner has never been charged or arrested in the death of Natalie Wood, and that this investigation is ongoing.
We're going to keep following this case as it develops.
I want to thank both my experts as well for being here.
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