On the occasion of the 66th birthday of the genius of dark fairy tales, we tell his love story with one of the most beautiful Italian actresses of our time.
Tim Burton is, without a doubt, one of the most original Hollywood creators, whose directorial style can be recognized among a thousand: dark visuals, gothic atmosphere, grotesque heroes and blurred boundaries of the target audience, that is, an appeal to both adults and children at once, to both at once and to neither.
Many will find his films too childish, while others will be too scary to watch with children. During his almost forty-year career, Burton gave us a whole scattering of films that subsequently secured cult status – Beetlejuice, Edward Scissorhands, Sweeney Todd, Corpse Bride and others.
However, Tim is not so much a director as a great Hollywood artist working with animated canvases. He is much more concerned with the formalist component than with the content – how the cinema looks, feels and, depending on the task set, delights or horrifies.
But the meanings in his works recede into the background, giving way to feelings. As befits any great artist, Burton’s work is continuously connected with his muses in real life. Moreover, in this case there is a strict periodization, which can be found in any biographical note about the director’s path.
Burton’s first lover, who influenced his career, was a striptease dancer, and later an actress and artist, Lisa Marie Smith. They met at the Goldfinger club back in 1992. At that time, the director already had the Batman duology with Michael Keaton, Beetlejuice and Edward Scissorhands with Johnny Depp under his belt.
At that time, Tim had already dissolved his marriage with photographer Lena Geiske and was free. This period is characterized by the author’s extraordinary fruitfulness. Burton was not shy about showering his beloved with compliments in public and interviews, calling her the muse of his life and casting her in all his films. At the suggestion of his beloved, the director began to engage in meditative practices and almost went into Zen esotericism.
The director’s next rather long period of work is associated with Helena Bonham Carter, best known for her role as Bellatrix Lestrange in the Harry Potter film series. It was 2001, and the couple got engaged right after the premiere of Planet of the Apes, where the latter played the role of the chimpanzee Ari.
As the director later admitted, she won him over not only with her enchanting energy, but also with how responsibly she approached her roles. In particular, during the filming of his “Planet of the Apes”, makeup took eight to ten hours a day, which not everyone could handle. And in order to realistically get into character, the actress attended a monkey training school.
This period in Burton’s career was rich in his most famous works, including Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, Alice in Wonderland, and Dark Shadows. Helena, like Lisa, often appeared in her husband’s films. In 2014, their union broke up after 13 years of marriage.
But to understand where the origins of the director’s next romance lie, let’s go back to 2006, to the small resort town of Cannes in the south of France. The romance in the air above the Boulevard de la Croisette, which stretches along the coastline of the Cannes part of the Côte d’Azur, contributed to the fact that even then Burton became fascinated with his new muse – the beautiful Monica Bellucci.
They met at an annual film festival. The Italian actress was on the jury at the time, as was Bonham Carter, by the way. However, Monica was also married to Frenchman Vincent Cassel at the time.
After parting ways with Helena, a bald spot appeared in Burton’s filmography. The incredibly prolific author in the past presented only two films in the next eight years – “Miss Peregrine’s Home for Peculiar Children” and a remake of the cartoon “Dumbo”. However, 2022 changed everything.
Firstly, Netflix released the extremely successful Wednesday, for which the director filmed the first half of the season and contributed as a showrunner to the project. Secondly, ironically, he met Monica Bellucci again in Cannes, from whose hands he received an honorary award. After which the couple began to be often spotted together, and in February 2023, Monica herself confirmed the status of their relationship in an interview for Elle.
It is interesting that Burton himself publicly confessed his love for the Italian film star a long time ago. In 2013, when answering a question from a journalist from the French magazine Gala about who he would like to be stuck in an elevator with, Tim answered that it would definitely be Monica Bellucci, since he is crazy about her.
However, at that time it sounded somewhat extravagant, because first of all the director named a regular in his dark fairy tales – Johnny Depp, which is why no one paid such attention to his words.
And in 2024, Tim does not change his tradition of filming his chosen ones in films. Soon, the Venice Film Festival will screen the film “Beetlejuice Beetlejuice”, where Monica plays the role of the ex-wife of a crazy ghost, in whose image one can easily recognize the features of Burton himself.
“I like his fairy-tale world, where monsters are good, as if we can turn our dark sides into something light, forgiving. Tim Burton’s films talk a lot about that,” said Monica Bellucci, answering the question of whether she likes her partner’s directing style.
