If you check my profile, should you care to, you will see that I have been a collector of entertainment memorabilia over the years. At one time, I had amassed a quite extensive collection of Natalie Wood material and in fact became known in collecting circles, being contacted by, among others, Lana Wood, Natalie’s sister, and Entertainment Tonight. More on all that another time.
Of all the long-distance contacts I made, one of the best was Tony Costello, who was Natalie’s secretary for a period in the mid- to latter-sixties. Although he might sound like a good old Italian-American boy, Tony was actually British, accent and all, which I discovered only when I saw him interviewed on TV. All of our contact was by mail. One of the best stories he told me was how he arranged a surprise party for “the boss” in 1966, for her 28th birthday.
That year, Natalie was filming Penelope, a little known comedy that she regretted doing the rest of her life. There were parties at the studio earlier in the afternoon, but the surprise was to be at her home later on, and Tony slipped away from the studio to set up that party, which was funded by Natalie’s friend, Norma Crane, and planned by Tony and his mother, who was Natalie’s housekeeper.
Here is the scene as described to me by Tony in one of his letters. He wrote quickly and in all caps, and his prose was not always tidy, so I’ve cleaned it up a bit: My mother had bought some whole sirloins, and we had set up a cooking area in the garden but secluded from the guests. The rest of the garden was filled with garden furniture and tables [and] a postage-size dance floor and a stage for the most God-awful rock group that I have ever heard.
He also hired caterers to handle all the serving and clearing and, as arranged with the neighbors, three valet parking attendants hid all the guests’ cars in the neighboring driveways, so Natalie wouldn’t see them when she arrived. Before he filled me in, I had wondered how they’d handled the parking. Natalie’s house was above Sunset Blvd. on a rather narrow street that went uphill to end in a cul de sac. Yes, I’ve been there. If cars were parked along one side of the street, there was no room for two-way traffic, and no way Natalie could not see them.
Unaware of Natalie’s fear of deep water at night, Tony had put all the presents on the end of the diving board of her pool. He was “really told off” by one of her friends, but she later “walked the plank” to get one of the presents; then Tony gathered the rest.
When she arrived home, Natalie was at first disappointed at seeing no cars, but Tony “gave the word and the lights went on and there was the cream of Hollywood standing in all their finery, singing Happy Birthday.” When Natalie reached her bedroom she found a yellow gown designed by Edith Head, who did the costumes for Penelope, and she came down to enjoy the party with her friends and family until the neighbors started to complain about the band, “and by eleven o’clock, the party was history.
Tony summed it up as follows: This whole party came in on a shoestring, but the logistics were 100% on the ball, and I earned a reputation for being a party organizer and was loaned out by Natalie on several occasions.
I enjoyed my correspondence with Tony over a few years, and he shared some great stories and sent me some photographs and other material he had saved. Sadly, Tony had smoked way too much in his youth and had battled emphysema for quite some time. He died about ten years ago, after losing that battle. But I still have his letters and will share some more of them from time to time.
