Monica Bellucci and Tim Burton 'in a relationship': the dating history of the Beetlejuice filmmaker

We are still trying to think of the perfect portmanteau for the newly announced couple of director Tim Burton and actress Monica Bellucci. We’re currently settling on BertUcci, but perhaps the couple themselves might have a better idea - as the pair were secretly dating for four months before becoming public with their relationship.

The 64-year-old mind behind The Nightmare Before Christmas, Edward Scissorhands and Ed Wood met the 58-year-old Bellucci over 16 years ago for the first time, but it was sparks from the recently single pair that were flying as they reconnected at Lumière Film Festival in Lyon last October. Burton was receiving a lifetime achievement award from the festival while Bellucci was a guest of honour.

Rumours that the pair had begun dating persisted at the tail end of 2022, with Bellucci having broken up with her most recent partner, artist Nicolas Lefebvre in 2019 after her 14 year marriage to actor Vince Cassel, while Burton had a highly publicised relationship with British actress Helena Bonham Carter CBE which ended amicably in 2014 - unlike his relationship with Lisa Marie Smith.

Speaking about the end of their relationship with Harper’s Bazaar in 2016, Bonham Carter explained how she dealt with the split, especially as she is the mother to Billy Ray Burton and Nell Burton from the long-standing relationship: “You go through massive grief - it is a death of a relationship, so it’s utterly bewildering. Your identity, everything, changes. Just saying: "I’m not myself at the moment, so be careful.” Everyone always says you have to be strong and have a stiff upper lip, but it’s okay to be fragile.”

For Tim Burton though, his new relationship is only the fourth that has been publicly recognized, and even if you ask both the representatives for Bellucci and Burton, they remained tight-lipped on the couple. Peopleworld takes a look at the history of Tim Burton’s love life, in celebration of the new couple.

Lena Gieseke (1987 - 1991)

Visual artist Lena Gieseke remains to this day the only person to have married Tim Burton, after the pair tied the knot in an intimate ceremony in 1989, having started dating two years prior. Gieseke met Burton while she was a photographer and was seen on the red carpet at the premiere of Burton’s first blockbuster film, Batman, back in 1989 - but the pair broke up two years later.

Gieseke stated the reason for the divorce was Burton’s “complicated and robust personality.”

Lisa Marie Smith (1993 - 2001)

Not long after the divorce from Lena Gieseke, Burton started dating New Jersey-born Lisa Marie Smith after they met at a Starbucks in 1993. Smith had just quit modelling and had come out of a four-year marriage and connected with Burton over UFO sightings in California, where the pair were living.

The pair got engaged on Valentine’s Day 1993, with the engagement lasting eight years until an acrimonious split around 2001. Burton called off the engagement at the same time as the premier of his remake of Planet of the Apes. Smith was cast in a small role while one of the leads in the poorly-received film was British actress Helena Bonham Carter.

Burton and Bonham Carter started dating later that year (with the common theory that the pair fell in love on the set of the sci-fi film), while in 2005, Marie held an auction of personal belongings that Burton had left behind. Ouch.

Helena Bonham Carter (2001 - 2014)

Perhaps the most endearing of relationships Burton had was his 13-year partnership with Helena Bonham Carter, which all started during the filming of Planet of the Apes in 2001. Such was Burton’s love of working with Helena that the pair went on to work on five more films together, almost giving Johnny Depp a run for his money for being Burton’s most frequent collaborator.

The pair had two children together, William Raymond Burton (who shares the same first names as Burton and Bonham Carter’s fathers) and Nell Burton, and owned neighbouring North London homes to allow the pair their own space, despite being around each other both on and off set.

The relationship came to an amicable end in 2014, and while Burton has continued his filmmaking career, we’ve yet to see the pair collaborate on the big screen since 2012’s Dark Shadows - yes, also starring Johnny Depp.