Pietra Thornton by Stephen Wayda for Playboy January 1998

One evening in 1991, struggling filmmaker Billy Bob Thornton spotted his dream girl outside an Italian restaurant in West Hollywood. "There's not a snowball's chance in hell of me getting your phone number, is there?" he drawled. "He was charming," says Pietra Thornton, who soon married the Arkansas auteur. They seemed to be a fairy-tale couple at last year's Academy Awards, where Billy Bob won and Oscar for Sling Blade. But, according to Pietra, Thornton had a dark side. She sued for divorce last spring. Pietra considers posing for Playboy to be her own declaration of independance. "This is my Oscar," she says.