Halle Berry Is Having a Ball With Her Monster Net Worth
From living in a shelter at age 21 to Oscar gold.
Halle Berry’s career has had higher highs and lower lows than the astronaut she played on Extant. The actress has starred in the X-Men franchise, won and Oscar for Monster’s Ball, and then a Razzie for Catwoman. Throughout it all, Berry has protected her artistic instincts and her net worth.
Berry has been a vocal advocate for equal pay in the entertainment industry, where female box office draws are often paid way less than their male counterparts. "I think when you believe you’re worth it, that’s when you’ll fight for it,” she told Forbes. “When you know that the work you’re providing is worth more than they’re willing to pay you, then you’ll ask for it. That’s when you’ll be willing to walk away from it if they say no. But you have to be willing to walk away...We have to own our worth and know our worth." How much is Berry worth, in dollars? Read on to find out.
What is Halle Berry’s net worth?
According to Celebrity Net Worth, Halle Berry is worth $90 million. This comes from things like her overall deal with Netflix, her decades of work with Revlon, and her movie star salary. Per Celebrity Net Worth, one of Berry’s first big paychecks was for Swordfish. Berry was paid $2 million for the film, a then-career high. She was then paid an additional $500,000 to shoot a topless scene.
Besides getting money for her performances in film and television, Berry has amassed some serious hardware. Berry was the first Black woman to win the Academy Award for Best Actress. "This moment is so much bigger than me,” Berry said when she won. “This is for every nameless, faceless woman of color who now has a chance tonight because this door has been opened." She also won an Emmy for playing Dorothy Dandridge, the first Black woman to be nominated for Best Actress.
Halle Barry was unhoused at 21
Berry moved to New York with some money from a modeling gig, which quickly ran out. She told People that when she ran dry, she asked her mother for money. “I mean three months later, I was out of my cash,” she said. “I called my mother and asked her to send me some money, and she said no, and that subsequently led to a year of not speaking to her because I was so upset that she wouldn’t help me.” As a result, Berry wound up unhoused for a period of time in her 20s, and lived in a shelter in New York.
Berry’s mom’s tough love left the two distant for some time, but in hindsight Berry says it was one of the best things her mom ever did for her. “It was to prove to her and everybody else. It took me right back to my high school years. ‘You say I can’t, watch me. I’m going to figure this out.’ And shelter life was part of figuring it out for a minute until I could get a waitressing job. Then I got a bartending job, and until I could figure that out, that’s what I did.”
Berry was paid very little for her Oscar-winning role
Halle Berry’s salary per film has varied wildly, with her price tag going up significantly after winning an Oscar. But that movie was one of her smallest paydays. According to her biographer, John Farley, Berry only netted $5000 profit on Monster’s Ball. “Halle was paid $100,000 for her part,” he wrote. “After all her expenses, she would say later, she cleared about $5,000 for doing the movie.”
"When [Monster’s Ball] came to me, I thought, okay, I’m getting no money to do this movie and it could either catapult my career or it could end it instantly,” she told Forbes. Berry was worried people would think she was being exploited in the film’s more sexually explicit elements. “I was so worried about being exploited,” she said, “but at the end of the day, at my soul, I’m an artist. Then the opposite actually happened. That just confirmed to me that life is about being authentic and doing what we believe in and not worrying about the outcome.”
How much did Halle Berry make after winning the Oscar?
One of Berry’s biggest paychecks ever was for Catwoman. According to Celebrity Net Worth, Berry got $14 million to play Patience Phillips, the woman who transforms into the iconic cat burglar in the film. "For me, it was one of the biggest paydays of my whole life, which, there's nothing wrong with that,” she told Entertainment Weekly. “I don't want to feel like 'Oh, I can only do award-worthy stuff.' What is an award-worthy performance?" Other women who have donned the catsuit include Michelle Pfeiffer, Zo? Kravitz, Julie Newmar, Eartha Kitt, and Adrienne Barbeau.
Unfortunately for Berry, Catwoman was a flop. Box Office Mojo says it’s only grossed $16,728,411 its opening weekend, and to this day has only made a little more than $82 million. It has yet to break even from its $100 million budget. Berry won the Razzie for her performance in the film, and brought her Oscar on stage with her to accept the award in person. “First of all, I want to thank Warner Bros. for putting me in a piece of s--t, god awful movie,” she said. “It was just what my career needed! You know, I was at the top and then Catwoman just plummeted me to the bottom. Love it! It’s hard being on top. It’s much better being on the bottom.” She also thanked “all 20” writers of the film.
What does Halle Berry do besides star in movies?
Beyond her movie acting, Berry has many projects on- and off-screen. Her big comeback post-Catwoman came on TV. Berry played an astronaut in the CBS show Extant. According to Entertainment Weekly, Berry commanded more than $100,000 an episode for the show, also serving as a co-executive producer. Extant ran for 26 episodes, so we’re talking about a cool $2.6 million. Wanting to stay close to her family has impacted Berry’s choices in roles. Part of the reason she made the choice to do TV was because of her family. ”I was being offered parts that I felt like I had done before,” she told EW. ”They weren’t exciting enough for me to leave my family for four months.” Berry then said she realized “some of the best writing, especially for women, was on television.”
Berry has also transitioned to directing. In 2021, she made her directorial debut with Bruised. The Netflix film starred Berry as a MMA fighter clawing for a comeback. "They gave me the script and I loved the story, but it was written for a twentysomething Irish Catholic white woman," Berry told Entertainment Weekly. "I couldn't get it out of my mind, so I thought, is it possible that this could be reimagined for someone like me?” On the first day of shooting, Berry broke two ribs but persevered through shooting. “The director in me said, 'I didn't come this far and work this hard to go home,’” she said of the decision to not halt filming to heal.
Berry also had one of the longest-running celebrity endorsement deals, with Revlon. Berry has been a spokesperson for the brand since 1996, and was making commercials for them as recently as 2020.
How does Halle Berry’s family affect her finances?
Berry has to pay child support for the daughter she shares with ex-boyfriend Gabriel Aubry. According to Nikki Swift, Berry has to pay over $16,000 a month until their daughter is 19-years-old, in 2027. Berry says she understands while people are interested in her finances, but draws the line with how the paparazzi used to stalk her daughter. ”I’m fair game, because it’s not about my kids,” she said in EW. ”I understand that being a celebrity, they want to write about these things. I’m never complaining about that. I wasn’t even complaining about the paparazzi hounding me every day until I became a mother and I saw what it was doing to my daughter. I’m an adult, I can handle it. Little children, they can’t. They don’t deserve it.” Berry testified at the California state house in favor of a law that prevents paparazzi from taking pics of celebrity kids in a harassing manner.
In 1996, Berry was sued for $80,000 by an ex-boyfriend, for money he allegedly loaned her when she was getting her career started. Per Nicki Swift, the case was thrown out when it was discovered that the ex didn’t list Berry as a debtor when he filed for bankruptcy in 1992. Berry has been divorced three times. Her second husband, Eric Benét, contested his prenup. But the Mirror reported in 2005 that she wound up with her finances intact. In 2015, Berry and her third husband Olivier Martinez filed for divorce with Berry representing herself. According to Entertainment Tonight, the divorce was finalized in 2023.
