88 - NATHALIE WOOD AND STEVE McQUEEN

NATHALIE WOOD AND STEVE McQUEEN Scene from Robert Mulligan’s film *Love with the Proper Stranger* (Une certaine rencontre), 1963. Photograph, vintage silver print, credits on the image, blank back. 20.5 x 25.6 cm. Some corner tips have been touched up, and there is a small tear along one edge. Note: Natalie Wood plays Angie Rossini, a young New York saleswoman from a traditional Italian-American family. After a brief affair with Rocky Papasano, a freelance musician played by Steve McQueen, she discovers she is pregnant and asks for his help in terminating the pregnancy. Faced with the dangers of an illegal abortion, the two characters gradually grow closer. Angie, however, refuses a marriage proposed out of a sense of duty: she demands a relationship based on desire, love, and free will. Filmed in black and white on the streets of New York, Robert Mulligan’s film tackles pregnancy outside of marriage, abortion, and women’s liberation with a frankness unusual for Hollywood cinema of the time. Natalie Wood was nominated for an Oscar for Best Actress.