Billy Bob Thornton's Relationship History Is Full Of Hollywood's Hottest Celebs

The following article mentions domestic abuse allegations and addiction.

Billy Bob Thornton's no stranger to the limelight. The veteran actor's vast filmography includes classic movies such as "Sling Blade," "Armageddon," and "Friday Night Lights," as well as TV shows such as "Hearts Afire," "Fargo," and "Landman." As successful and famous as he may be, he doesn't see himself as a part of the Tinseltown glitterarti. "I stay home," he told People in 2025. "I'm not really much of a part of Hollywood, as you say. I'm at home with the family, or I'm in a recording studio or on the road or making this. Those are the things I do, and I just kind of mind my own business."

Though Thornton doesn't consider himself to be "much a part of Hollywood" nowadays, his romantic history paints quite a different picture. Over the years, he's romanced a "Playboy" model, become engaged to a David Lynch mainstay, and married Angelina Jolie, one of the biggest stars in the entire history of the movie business. He eventually settled down with someone who wasn't a public figure before she met him, and evidently, that has worked out well. 

Reflecting on his past relationships, the "Landman" star told Rolling Stone in 2025, "The other times I got married were just like, you had a little too much to drink one night and somebody said, 'We should get married.' You go, 'Yeah, OK.' I always tell people, 'At least I was trying.'" Here's a look at Thornton's love life, from his first marriage to the happy relationship he's in today. 

Billy Bob Thornton's first marriage was to Melissa Lee Gatlin , who is not a public figure. They married in 1978, and it sounds like it was a quick courtship. Per The Chicago Tribune, he once said of their marriage, "I went bowling one night, and ended up married. It was one of those deals." The two tied the knot before Thornton made his film debut in "Hunter's Blood," a thriller that was released in 1986.

Thornton and Gatlin welcomed a daughter, Amanda Brumfield, into the world in 1979 before divorcing in 1980. Per People, Gatlin was the one who filed for divorce, citing "incompatibility and adultery on his part" as her motivation. Thornton has said that he didn't have much of a relationship with his eldest daughter when she was younger. "She didn't grow up with me, and so we were pretty much strangers for years," he told the U.K.'s Mail on Sunday in 2005 (via People). "Then a few years later, we reconnected, and it's really good now." However, when Brumfield was arrested following the death of her friend's child in 2009, the actor's rep told CNN that he "had no contact with her for quite some time." 

Gatlin, on the other hand, spoke out on Brumfield's behalf after she was charged, telling the New York Post in 2010 (via ABC News), "It's just a horrible situation and it's being made worse and exploding even more just because of who my ex-husband is." Though Brumfield maintained her innocence, she was convicted of aggravated manslaughter in 2011. She was released from prison in 2020. 

Billy Bob Thornton's second wife, Toni Lawrence, got her start in acting before they met. She appeared in the classic TV shows "McCloud" and "Quincy M.E." in the 1970s, as well as the Troma horror flick "Pigs (aka Daddy's Deadly Darling)." In the '80s, she was on 13 episodes of "Days of Our Lives."

Thornton and Lawrence married in 1986, separated in 1987, and divorced in 1988. Since then, Lawrence has exited the world of acting and has gone all in on the world of pottery. "I started working in clay in the 1970's when my friend Herve Villechaize invited me to a pottery class where I learned to throw on a wheel," she shared on her website. "When my wheel at home broke, I started hand-building and fell in love with the organic feel of a cup; I never looked back!"

While the Oscar winner hasn't said much about this particular marriage, he has offered some thoughts on his relationship timeline overall. And frankly, it sounds like it all started to blur together after a while. When talking about getting hitched a whopping six times on an episode of "The Drew Barrymore Show," Thornton suggested that his marriage history harkens back to Hollywood's Golden Age. "You know when you go on the internet to look something up and it leads you to a bunch of other stuff and you don't really want to look at it but you do anyway? ... So, I'm looking at it one day and they had the people with the most marriages in Hollywood," he continued. "And I was the only person who was alive on it. I mean, it had like Mickey Rooney and Elizabeth Taylor and all these people — people who started in the '30s."

Cynda Williams is an actor who married Billy Bob Thornton in 1990. She is best known for her roles in Spike Lee's "Mo' Better Blues" and the 1992 thriller "One False Move." She appeared in the latter with Thornton, though their relationship ended by the time the film was released.

During a 2022 interview with CloselyObservedFrames, Williams discussed why she loves acting. "I find for me that it has been therapeutic," she said. "I do it for many reasons, but one of those reasons is very selfish. It enables me to be any kind of person I want to be at any given time. ... It's just so therapeutic to be able to act out these walls without having to live those lives. It gives me the opportunity to delve deep into the minds and hearts of all kinds of people. It just helps me love them even that much more. I love people because part of my job is to be able to analyze and understand the characters that I play. It opens me up to being more loving and less judgmental of humanity."

Following her relationship with Thornton, Williams continued to act. She appeared in several smaller films, telling N'Digo that her favorite movies in her catalog include the lesser-known "Relax...It's Just Sex" and "When Do We Eat?" — both of which have ensemble casts. After becoming a mother, she took a break from her acting career to raise her daughter before returning to show business. In addition, Williams penned a book called "Pink Pantie Confessions." She currently is active on Instagram Live.

In 1992, Billy Bob Thornton met Pietra Dawn Cherniak, a "Playboy" model, outside a restaurant. The following year, the couple married. Cherniak and Billy Bob welcomed two kids: William Langston Thornton and Harry James Thornton. In his 2012 memoir "The Billy Bob Tapes A Cave Full of Ghosts," the actor revealed the couple named William after a relative of Billy Bob's who served in the American Civil War.

The story of Harry's name has to do with the kindness that a show business insider showed Billy Bob and his family. In 1993, the family's home burnt to the ground along with all their possessions. The first night following this tragedy, the family slept in the dressing room at CBS because they had no other options. During this difficult time, Harry Thomason, a producer Billy Bob worked with on the show "Evening Shade," gave the family some money and paid for them to stay at a hotel and buy new clothes. The couple named Harry after Thomason.

Reflecting on his relationship with Cherniak during a 2002 interview with The Guardian, Billy Bob said he had issues during their relationship. "I was kinda wild back then,' he said. "I wasn't living right, just spinning out of control. But I quit drugs 21 years ago, and I ain't had a drink in six years. It took a while but I sorted myself out." In 1997, Cherniak filed for divorce from Billy Bob, alleging physical and verbal abuse. In a statement, he maintained the allegations were false (via the Chicago Tribune).

Laura Dern has been part of mainstream Hollywood and the cinematic underground for many years. You may recognize her from blockbuster movies such as "Jurassic Park," "Jurassic Park III," and "Star Wars: The Last Jedi," as well as the David Lynch films "Blue Velvet," "Wild at Heart," and "Inland Empire." Dern and Billy Bob Thornton's relationship began in 1997 after they met while filming an episode of "Ellen." The two became engaged but they called it off in 1999 after he struck up a courtship with his "Pushing Tin" costar. This affair drama haunted Billy Bob Thornton for years.

In 2000, Dern opened up about the relationship. "I left our home to work on a movie, and while I was away, my boyfriend got married, and I've never heard from him again," she said in an interview with Talk Magazine (via ABC News). "It's like a sudden death. For no one has there been any closure or clarity." Thornton and Dern both appeared in the film "Daddy and Them," which Thornton also wrote and directed.

When Thornton and Dern briefly crossed paths at the Golden Globes in 2017, there was quite a bit of chatter and speculation about the interaction — or should we say lack of interaction. As Thornton neared the stage to give his acceptance speech for his work on the show "Goliath," Dern kept her back to him as he passed her table. While it could've meant nothing, the moment certainly caught the eyes of social media users, who found it awkward.

Before there was Brangelina, there was Billy Bob Thornton and Angelina Jolie. The two fell in love while making "Pushing Tin," married in 2000, and divorced in 2003. While they didn't work out in the long run, the world may never forget their blood vials or his infamous remark about their ride to the "Gone In 60 Seconds" premiere.

By all accounts, the two actors' chemistry was off the charts. Look no further than the 2000 interview with Us Weekly where Jolie gushed over Thornton. "The other day we were mentioning how I needed to get one of those heart monitors on me because I'm convinced I'm going to have a heart attack," she stated. "He kissed me the other day and I nearly fainted. I swear on my family's lives. I nearly fell over." The "Tomb Raider" actor continued, "I feel so complete and safe and warm and in love and then I just feel like I'm on fire and I'm so excited and I didn't know I could feel that through my entire body," she said.

Though Thornton and Jolie's relationship ended in divorce, there doesn't seem to be any ill will between the two. During a 2008 interview with Maxim, Thornton praised Jolie, and even shared that they apparently hoped to work together again some day. "Maybe a comedy," he said. "In other words, we wouldn't want to do a movie about a husband-wife relationship. That probably wouldn't be very good." In 2025, Thornton told Rolling Stone that he and Jolie are still on good terms and maintained there wasn't that much drama surrounding their divorce. "That was the one that ended up being a really civilized breakup," he said. "We simply split up because our lifestyles were so different."

One of Billy Bob Thornton's most famous roles was the title character in the 2003 dark comedy "Bad Santa," one of the darker Christmas films to enter the Yuletide canon. On "The Drew Barrymore Show," Billy Bob revealed he met a makeup artist on the set of "Bad Santa," who introduced him to her sister, a puppeteer and makeup artist named Connie Angland. "[The makeup artist said], 'My sister's gonna visit and I got a feeling that you're really gonna like her,'" Billy Bob recalled. "And sure enough, I did. And we were together within probably a couple of months, maybe. She kind of drug me out of the gutter which was awesome," Billy Bob said. "We met at a time when I needed somebody to meet me because I was going through kind of a lost weekend."

In 2004, the couple welcomed a daughter named Bella Thornton into the world. Billy Bob and Angland married in 2014 and have been together ever since. That's interesting, considering that, in 2008, Billy Bob told Maxim he had no intention of tying the knot again. 

On the aforementioned episode of "The Drew Barrymore Show," the "Landman" actor pointed out that his relationship with Angland has been longer than all of his other five marriages combined. As for the secret to the longevity of their relationship? In 2025, Billy Bob told Fox News that the answer is simple: he and Angland are friends.

If you or anyone you know needs help with addiction issues, or is dealing with domestic abuse, please contact the resources below:

• Visit the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration website or contact SAMHSA's National Helpline at 1-800-662-HELP (4357).
• Call the National Domestic Violence Hotline at 1−800−799−7233. You can also find more information, resources, and support at their website.