Billy Bob Thornton is arguably the originator of what I fondly like to call “gas station chic.” Let’s not forget 2000–2003, the style era that overlapped with his intensely public marriage to Angelina Jolie. The pair were constantly photographed canoodling on red carpets, while Thornton reliably sported a trucker hat and a wicked smirk. Now, as he promotes his latest project—the record-breaking Paramount+ series Landman—Thornton seems to be nudging his famously dirtbaggish style in a new direction. His character, Tommy Norris, may dress like a cowboy, but the actor himself appears to be taking cues from the British glam rock gods of yesteryear.
Just last week, the 70-year-old stepped out in Manhattan wearing a look that split the difference between his old sensibilities and something altogether more theatrical. Up top: his signature trucker hat, this one emblazoned with the logo of his band, The Boxmasters. Beneath it: familiar BBT base layers—a broken-in graphic tee, an unbuttoned olive corduroy shirt, and pointy suede Saint Laurent harness boots. But then came the volta: an opulent black military-style jacket that wouldn’t look out of place on Ann Demeulemeester’s or Burberry’s recent runways, or Dimes Square literary it-girls of today.
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The ubiquity of this Nutcracker-adjacent jacket in recent collections has helped push the silhouette back into fashion, especially among people who lived through indie sleaze—or just followed it religiously on early-2000s Tumblr. On Thornton, the outer layer evokes Mick Jagger and Freddie Mercury—icons whose style, like his, was louche, sleazy, and devilishly charming, but with a distinctly British tilt. Thornton has also adopted another striking, glam-leaning detail in the form of a unique headwear combo: a felt fedora layered over another hat, a look long similar to that of another flamboyant British star, Boy George.
Thornton sported this millinery mash-up twice this week—first at the BMI Country Awards, then again at the CMA Awards, both in Nashville. For a heartland native attending country-music events, he looked more like a retired New Romantic than an Arkansan. But rest assured that he hasn’t abandoned his sartorial roots. Thornton is still wearing the trucker hats, chain necklaces, and pointy cowboy boots that defined his early-aughts swagger. He’s just evolving the aesthetic, weaving in Euro glam references while keeping the rockabilly ruggedness that made him such a cultural fixture in the first place.