Kitten Natividad, the raunchy adult-film actress who became a pop culture legend through her collaboration with filmmaker Russ Meyer, apparently passed away unexpectedly over the weekend.
She was 74 years old.
Her friend, director Cody Jarrett, wrote on Twitter, “It is with great regret that we must announce the sudden demise of our dear friend and cast member, the lovely and incomparable Kitten Natividad.”
From our director Cody Jarrett
It is with tremendous sadness we must announce the sudden passing of our dear friend and cast member, the beautiful, unforgettable Kitten Natividad. pic.twitter.com/HIYyq5GsFc
— Tura Satana (@theturasatana) September 25, 2022
“We will always love and miss you, Kitten, and may every drop of the love, beauty, and goodness you lavished upon others accompany you into the next realm for eternity. God bless you, Kitten.”
The Mexican-American exotic dancer was born on February 13, 1948, and moved to Mexico at age ten. She worked for Stella Stevens and IBM before receiving breast augmentation in 1969.
While her new form propelled her career, it also made her ill; she later discovered that industrial-grade silicone, which is unsuitable for the human body, was used in her surgery. Additionally, she ultimately underwent a double mastectomy to combat breast cancer.
Natividad appears in Russ Meyer’s cult classics “Up!” (1976) and “Beneath the Valley of the Ultra-Vixens” (1979), which Meyer co-wrote with cinema critic Roger Ebert. She eventually became his significant other for several years.
In addition to her work in adult films, Natividad was known for stripping at Sean Penn’s bachelor party in 1985, before his marriage to Madonna, and for several film credits, such as “My Tutor” (1983), “Another 48 Hours” (1984), and “Another 48 Hours” (1985). (1990).
Meyer died in 2004.
