Halle Berry Biography

Born August 14, 1968, in Cleveland, Ohio, Halle is the youngest daughter born to Jerome and Judith Berry, an interracial couple. Halle, and her older sister Heidi, spent the first few years of their childhood living in an inner-city neighborhood. Her abusive father, Jerome Berry, abandoned his wife and children, and left the family when Halle was four years old. Halle was raised almost totally by her mother, Judith, a psychiatric nurse. Judith then moved her family to the predominantly white Cleveland suburb of Bedford.

Halle Berry attended Cuyahoga Community College in Cleveland, but she dropped out in pursuit of her acting career. She first appeared on the television sitcom, "Living Dolls." Her break into film came with a role as the crack-addicted girlfriend of the main character's brother in "Jungle Fever". Since then she has enjoyed a steady stream of work in film. In 1999 she won a Golden Globe for her title role in Introducing Dorothy Dandridge.

This rough start to her life did not deter her from excelling in whatever she did. Halle attended a nearly all-white public school, and as a result, she was subjected to discrimination at an early age. Throughout high school, Halle participated in a variety of extracurricular activities, holding positions of newspaper editor, class president, member of the honor society, varsity cheerleader, and prom queen.

Halle Berry easily won Miss Ohio, Miss Teen All-American, and in 1986, was first runner-up in the Miss USA pageant. She was the first African American to represent the U.S. in the Miss World competition in London. Halle attended Cleveland's Cuyahoga Community College, where she studied broadcast journalism. Halle abandoned her idea of a career in news reporting however, choosing to wholeheartedly devote her time to a career in entertainment. She first moved to Chicago, then New York City, where she found work as a catalog model.

Halle Berry, now with a few films under her belt, accepted more offbeat roles, making cameos in the rockumentary "CB4" which traced the rise and fall of the titled rap group. She then starred in the live action version of "The Flintstones", featuring Halle as a Stone Age seductress, a very sexy and successful performance.

Halle's next role was a no-holds-barred performance as a rehabilitated crack addict seeking to regain custody of her son in "Losing Isaiah". The story was set in the midst of a bitter custody battle with adoptive parents, played by Jessica Lange and David Strathairn. Later that year, Halle overcame Hollywood's racial barriers when she was cast as the first African American to play the Queen of Sheeba in Showtime’s movie "Solomon & Sheeba".

In 1993, Halle Berry married Atlanta Braves outfielder David Justice, and three years later, Berry filed for a divorce, which was finalized in 1997. After a nasty divorce from Justice, Halle became secretly engaged to Eric Benét, a jazz musician, in August of 1999. The engagement was announced in December of that year. Halle introduced Benét as her "husband" at the public unveiling of her official Web site, Hallewood, in February 2001.