Halle Berry
Halle Maria Berry is an American actress. She began her career as a model and entered several beauty contests, becoming Miss Ohio in 1986 and finishing as the first runner-up in Miss USA 1986 and placing sixth in Miss World 1986. Her breakthrough film role was in the romantic comedy Boomerang, alongside Eddie Murphy, which led to roles in The Flintstones and Bulworth. She later produced and starred in the television film Introducing Dorothy Dandridge, for which she won a Primetime Emmy Award and a Golden Globe Award.
Berry established herself as one of the highest-paid actresses in Hollywood during the 2000s. For her performance of a struggling widow in the romantic drama Monster's Ball, she became the only African-American woman to win the Academy Award for Best Actress, and the first woman of color. Berry took on high-profile roles such as Storm in four installments of the X-Men film series, the henchwoman of a robber in the thriller Swordfish, Bond girl Jinx in Die Another Day, a psychiatrist in Gothika, and the title role in the much-derided Catwoman.
A varying critical and commercial reception followed in subsequent years, with Perfect Stranger, Cloud Atlas and The Call being among her notable film releases in that period. She appeared in the action films Kingsman: The Golden Circle and John Wick: Chapter 3 – Parabellum and made her directorial debut with the Netflix drama Bruised.
Berry produced the television film Lackawanna Blues, for which she received nominations for a Producers Guild of America Award, a Golden Globe Award, and an Emmy Award. She has since produced several projects in which she also performed, including Frankie & Alice and the CBS science fiction series Extant. In 2014, Berry launched the production company 606 Films. She has been a Revlon spokesmodel since 1996. She was formerly married to baseball player David Justice, singer-songwriter Eric Benét, and actor Olivier Martinez. Berry has two children. She shares her first child with her former partner Gabriel Aubry, a model, and she shares her second child with Martinez.
Early life
Berry was born Maria Halle Berry in Cleveland, Ohio, on August 14, 1966, to Judith Ann, a first generation American whose mother, Nelle Hawkins, came from Liverpool, and Jerome Jesse Berry, an African-American man. Her name was legally changed to Halle Maria Berry at the age of five. Her parents selected her middle name from Halle's Department Store, then a local landmark in Cleveland. Berry's mother worked as a psychiatric nurse, and her father worked in the same hospital as an attendant in the psychiatric ward. He later became a bus driver. They divorced when Berry was four years old, and she and her older sister Heidi Berry-Henderson were raised exclusively by their mother.She has been estranged from her father since childhood, noting in 1992 that she did not even know if he was still alive. Her father was abusive to her mother; Berry has recalled witnessing her mother being beaten daily, kicked down stairs, and hit in the head with a wine bottle. Berry has also said that she was bullied as a child and, as a result, learned how to fight and protect herself.
Berry grew up in Oakwood, Ohio, and graduated from Bedford High School, where she was a cheerleader, honor student, editor of the school newspaper, and prom queen. She worked in the children's department of Higbee's department store. She continued her studies at Cuyahoga Community College. In the 1980s, she entered several beauty contests, winning Miss Teen All American 1985 and Miss Ohio USA 1986. She was the 1986 Miss USA first runner-up, with Christy Fichtner of Texas taking home the crown. In the Miss USA 1986 pageant interview competition, Berry said she hoped to become an entertainer or do some kind of work in media. Her interview was awarded the highest score by the judges. In 1986, Berry became the first African-American to represent the United States at the Miss World beauty pageant. She placed sixth, with Trinidad and Tobago's Giselle Laronde being crowned Miss World.
Career
Early work and breakthrough (1989–1999)
In 1989, Berry moved to New York City to pursue her acting ambitions. During her early time there, she ran out of money and briefly lived in a homeless shelter and a YMCA. After turning down numerous roles that required nudity, she said she decided to make Swordfish because her then-husband, Eric Benét, supported her and encouraged her to take risks.Berry appeared as Leticia Musgrove, the troubled wife of an executed murderer, in the 2001 feature film Monster's Ball. Her performance was awarded the National Board of Review and the Screen Actors Guild Award for Best Actress. She became the first African-American woman to win the Academy Award for Best Actress. The NAACP issued the statement: "Congratulations to Halle Berry and Denzel Washington for giving us hope and making us proud. If this is a sign that Hollywood is finally ready to give opportunity and judge performance based on skill and not on skin color then it is a good thing."
This role generated controversy. Her graphic nude love scene with a racist character played by co-star Billy Bob Thornton was the subject of much media chatter and discussion among African Americans. Many in the African-American community were critical of Berry for taking the part. Berry responded: "I don't really see a reason to ever go that far again. That was a unique movie. That scene was special and pivotal and needed to be there, and it would be a really special script that would require something like that again."
Berry asked for a higher fee for Revlon advertisements after winning the Oscar. Ron Perelman, the cosmetics firm's chief, congratulated her, saying how happy he was that she modeled for his company. She replied, "Of course, you'll have to pay me more." Perelman stalked off in a rage. In accepting her award, she gave an acceptance speech honoring previous black actresses who had never had the opportunity. She said, "This moment is so much bigger than me. This is for every nameless, faceless woman of color who now has a chance tonight because this door has been opened."
As Bond girl Giacinta 'Jinx' Johnson in the 2002 Die Another Day, Berry filmed an homage to Dr. No, emerging from the surf to be greeted by James Bond as Ursula Andress had 40 years earlier. Lindy Hemming, costume designer on Die Another Day, had insisted that Berry wear a bikini and knife as a homage. Berry has said of the scene: "It's splashy," "exciting," "sexy," "provocative" and "it will keep me still out there after winning an Oscar." According to an ITV news poll, Jinx was voted the fourth toughest girl on screen of all time. Berry was hurt during filming when debris from a smoke grenade flew into her eye. It was removed in a 30-minute operation. After Berry won the Academy Award, rewrites were commissioned to give her more screentime for X2.
She starred in the psychological thriller Gothika opposite Robert Downey, Jr. in November 2003. She had broken her arm while filming a scene with Downey, who twisted her arm too hard. Production was halted for eight weeks while she healed. It was a moderate hit at the United States box office, taking in $60 million; it earned another $80 million abroad. Berry appeared in the nu metal band Limp Bizkit's music video for "Behind Blue Eyes" for the motion picture soundtrack for the film. The same year, she was named No. 1 in FHMs 100 Sexiest Women in the World poll.
Berry starred as the title role in the film Catwoman, for which she received US$12.5 million. It is widely regarded by critics as one of the worst films ever made. She was awarded the Worst Actress Razzie Award for her performance; she appeared at the ceremony to accept the award in person with a sense of humor, considering it an experience of the "rock bottom" in order to be "at the top." Holding the Academy Award in one hand and the Razzie in the other she said, "I never in my life thought that I would be up here, winning a Razzie! It's not like I ever aspired to be here, but thank you. When I was a kid, my mother told me that if you could not be a good loser, then there's no way you could be a good winner."
Established actress and career fluctuations (2005–2013)
Her next role was in the Oprah Winfrey-produced ABC television film Their Eyes Were Watching God, an adaptation of Zora Neale Hurston's novel of the same name. Berry portrayed a free-spirited woman whose unconventional sexual mores upset her 1920s contemporaries in a small community. She received her second Primetime Emmy Award nomination for her role. Also in 2005, she served as an executive producer in Lackawanna Blues. She was the voice for the character of Cappy, one of the many mechanical beings in the animated feature Robots.In the thriller Perfect Stranger, Berry starred with Bruce Willis, playing a reporter who goes undercover to uncover the killer of her childhood friend. The film grossed a modest US$73 million worldwide, and received lukewarm reviews from critics, who felt that despite the presence of Berry and Willis, it is "too convoluted to work, and features a twist ending that's irritating and superfluous." Her next 2007 film release was the drama Things We Lost in the Fire, co-starring Benicio del Toro. She played a recently widowed woman who befriended the troubled friend of her late husband. The film was the first time in which she worked with a female director, Danish Susanne Bier, giving her a new feeling of "thinking the same way," which she appreciated. While the film made US$8.6 million in its global theatrical run, it garnered positive reviews. The Austin Chronicle found the film to be "an impeccably constructed and perfectly paced drama of domestic and internal volatility" and felt that "Berry is brilliant here, as good as she's ever been."
In April 2007, Berry was awarded a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame in front of the Kodak Theatre at 6801 Hollywood Boulevard for her contributions to the film industry. By the end of the decade, she established herself as one of the highest-paid actresses in Hollywood, earning an estimated $10 million per film.
In the independent drama Frankie and Alice, Berry played the leading role of a young multiracial American woman with dissociative identity disorder; she struggled against her alter personality to retain her true self. The film received a limited theatrical release, to a mixed critical response. The Hollywood Reporter described the film as "a well-wrought psychological drama that delves into the dark side of one woman's psyche" and found Berry to be "spellbinding" in it. She earned the African-American Film Critics Association Award for Best Actress and a Golden Globe Award nomination for Best Actress – Motion Picture Drama. She next made part of a large ensemble cast in Garry Marshall's romantic comedy New Year's Eve, with Michelle Pfeiffer, Jessica Biel, Robert De Niro, Josh Duhamel, Zac Efron, Sarah Jessica Parker, and Sofía Vergara, among many others. In the film, she took on the supporting role of a nurse befriending a man in the final stages. While the film was panned by critics, it made US$142 million worldwide.
In 2012, Berry starred as an expert diver tutor alongside then-husband Olivier Martinez in the little-seen thriller Dark Tide. She led an ensemble cast opposite Tom Hanks and Jim Broadbent in The Wachowskis' epic science fiction film Cloud Atlas, with each of the actors playing six different characters across a period of five centuries. Budgeted at US$128.8 million, Cloud Atlas made US$130.4 million worldwide. It garnered polarized reactions from both critics and audiences.
Berry appeared in a segment of the independent anthology comedy Movie 43, which the Chicago Sun-Times called "the Citizen Kane of awful." Berry found greater success with her next performance, as a 9-1-1 operator receiving a call from a girl kidnapped by a serial killer, in the crime thriller The Call. Berry was drawn to "the idea of being a part of a movie that was so empowering for women. We don't often get to play roles like this, where ordinary people become heroic and do something extraordinary." Manohla Dargis of The New York Times found the film to be "an effectively creepy thriller," while reviewer Dwight Brown felt that "the script gives Berry a blue-collar character she can make accessible, vulnerable and gutsy." The Call was a sleeper hit, grossing US$68.6 million around the globe.