Monica Bellucci's Real Name: Monica Bellucci

Quick answer: Monica Bellucci was born under her own name and has always worked as Monica Bellucci. She was born on September 30, 1964, in Città di Castello, in the Umbria region of Italy. She studied law, became a top model, and then starred in Malèna, Irréversible, The Matrix sequels, The Passion of the Christ, and the Bond film Spectre (Library of Congress; The Guardian).

Real name and early life

The Library of Congress name authority files her as "Bellucci, Monica, 1964-." One citation describes an "Italian actress and model, born 30 September 1964." A second gives her birthplace as Città di Castello, Perugia, but lists the year as 1968. The authority heading and other sources use 1964. Wikipedia gives her full name as Monica Anna Maria Bellucci; we did not find the middle names in the other sources checked, so this page treats her publicly known name as her documented name.

In a 2005 profile, The Guardian wrote that she was born in the small Umbrian town of Città di Castello in 1964 and grew up wanting to be a lawyer. While she was studying at the University of Perugia, a friend took her to modeling agencies in Milan, where she was "snapped up on the spot." Modeling first paid for her studies. "I started travelling for work and I left the university," she told the paper, adding that law "was too boring for me, for my personality."

Career highlights

Bellucci moved from modeling into film, and in a 2022 Guardian interview she said she was "already 25 and independent" when she started acting. While filming the French thriller L'Appartement (1996), she met actor Vincent Cassel. The Guardian says their marriage lasted from 1999 to 2013. She and Cassel made several films together, including Gaspar Noé's Irréversible (2002), and they have two daughters.

Giuseppe Tornatore chose her for Malèna (2000), she told the Guardian, though she believed the producers wanted a better-known actress. She played in The Matrix sequels and played Mary Magdalene in Mel Gibson's The Passion of the Christ (2004). The 2022 profile notes she became the oldest Bond girl, in Spectre (2015).

The same interview covered her stage debut, a role she took on despite lifelong stage fright. She plays opera singer Maria Callas in Maria Callas: Letters and Memoirs, directed by Tom Volf, which she has performed in Paris and at the ancient Odeon of Herodes Atticus in Athens.

Name notes for searchers

Bellucci has always used her birth name. The 1968 date in one library citation is an outlier; most records give September 30, 1964.