The Untold Truth Of Tim Burton

As detailed in "Burton on Burton," Tim Burton was born August 25, 1958 in Burbank, California. His father, Bill Burton, a former minor league baseball player, worked for the Burbank Parks and Recreation Department. His mother Jean "Rickie" Burton worked part time in a photo lab and later ran a feline-themed gift shop called Cats Plus.

Although Burbank, located in the San Fernando Valley just 12 miles from downtown Los Angeles, is a hub for the entertainment industry and home to Warner Brothers, NBC, and Walt Disney Studios, the suburban city was anything but glamorous to a young, artistic outsider like Tim Burton. "[In] Burbank, California, there's no seasons. It's kind of like growing up on an empty canvas," Burton told MTV in the 1994 documentary "Freaks, Nerds, and Weirdos." "You're forced to create your own world."

Growing up, an introverted Burton often felt alienated from his peers and sought refuge from the banality of suburban life in movies and television. Classic horror such as "Dracula" and "The Bride of Frankenstein" and '70s grindhouse and exploitation shockers like "Scream, Blacula, Scream," and "Dr. Jekyll and Sister Hyde" shaped his sense of aesthetics and substituted for a social life. "I didn't have a lot of friends," he explains in "Burton on Burton," "but there's enough weird movies out there so you can go a long time without friends and see something new every day that kind of speaks to you."

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