Vintage Hunk: Robert Wagner

Robert Wagner is a true survivor. At 81 this popular actor can look back on a life and a career that fluctuated from incredible to tragic. Best known for his popular TV series Hart to Hart and his two marriages to screen legend Natalie Wood, Wagner was one of the sexiest stars of the 1950s who grew up to be a fine actor— even if he was never given a really great role.

 Robert John Wagner was born in 1930 in Detroit, Michigan. His father was a well-to-do businessman who moved the family to California. Wagner caddied at a popular Country Club where he met a lot of stars who would later become friends. After a few small roles, Wagner's big break came in the Susan Hayward smash biopic With a Song in My Heart. This sudsy story of singer Jane Froman who was crippled in a plane crash had a wonderfully maudlin scene near the end where Hayward/Froman sings to a shell-shocked young soldier. He was played by Wagner, and this small scene led to a flurry of fan letters and a contract with 20th Century Fox.

His chief rival at 20th was sexy Jeffrey Hunter, who was always vying for the same good roles as Wagner. There is a wonderful, unbelievably sexy photo of the two of them in a swimming pool (left) where Wanger looks like he has a real "gay" surprise for Hunter.

Good roles in Broken Lance and Stars and Stripes Forever were overshadowed by really terrible movies like Beneath the 12-Mile Reef where he played a Greek-American fisherman with one of the worst perms in Hollywood history. Junk like Prince Valiant did not help, either. (Wagner would make fun of his pageboy wig in this hilarious turkey for years.) The only really good dramatic role that came his way was the twisted killer in A Kiss Before Dying. Based on Ira Levin's (Rosemary's Baby) brilliant mystery novel, Kiss is the story of a man who murders two sisters and tries to marry the third for her money. The film version was a bit pedestrian. It eliminated one sister and was not particularly well directed, but Wagner showed real acting promise in his downbeat role and Joanne Woodward was equally effective in one of her first roles as Wagner's murder victim. (Her murder scene from the roof of a tall building is the film's scariest shocker.)

If Wagner's film career was stalling a bit, his social life was in high gear and climaxed with his December 1957 marriage to 19-year-old starlet Natalie Wood. Her career was ascending after her Oscar-nominated role in the James Dean classic Rebel Without a Cause. "Nat" and "RJ," as they were dubbed, became the heartthrobs of teenagers all across the country. As Wood's career had a major star making year in 1961 with her Oscar nominated Splendor in the Grass and West Side Story, Wagner's early screen promise fizzled out with a series of more bad films. The Golden Couple divorced in 1962 amid speculation that Wood's romance with Splendor co-star Warren Beatty was the main cause. Wagner took off for Europe, made something of a film comeback with The Pink Panther and Harper, but his career took a fantastic upswing in 1968 when he made his television series debut in It Takes a Thief. This wonderful show cast Wagner as sophisticated thief Alexander Mundy. With screen legend Fred Astaire playing his father, Thief was a huge fan favorite.

Wagner followed this show with two more hit series: Switch with Eddie Albert and Hart to Hart. Co-starring Stefanie Powers, Hart to Hart was fun series where the couple played married amateur detectives Jonathan and Jennifer Hart. America was in love with the Harts and Robert Wagner.

At the peak of his newly-regained popularity and career upswing, everything got upstaged by his fairy tale re-marriage to Natalie Wood in 1972. Both had been married in the interim and each had a child, but this was the talk of the country and the fan furor increased with the birth of their daughter Courtney. Wood temporarily retired to become a mother and Wagner's star was at its zenith. His performance as Brick in their joint TV movie Cat on a Hot Tin Roof was excellent and well-received by the critics.

Then Wagner's life collapsed on Thanksgiving weekend 1981 when Wood drowned off Catalina Island where the Wagner yacht Splendor was moored. As Wood's film co-star Christopher Walken was on board, the resulting media furor went beyond hysteria with foul speculation and cheap gossip. Sifting through all the crap and innuendo lay one simple fact: Robert Wagner lost the love of his life and the mother of his child.

In the following years Wagner pretty much kept going by concentrating on his three children (he became legal guardian to Natalie's other girl), working hard (and becoming a de-facto star in the Austin Powers film series) and developing a new relationship with actress Jill St. John whom he married in 1990. Through it all Wagner wisely refrained from publicly discussing Wood or his personal life. Doing a sympathy run through the tabloids was not his style. In 2008 Wagner published his autobiography and it was pretty honest and down to earth without anything salacious that might have sold more copies.

Robert Wagner has survived due to good health and - amazingly in Hollywood - good taste. He was always friends with the old guard stars and now that he is one of those legendary old timers it is nice to see that the sexy young hunk of the '50s is one of the most respected actors still working today.