20 years after her historic win, Halle Berry says still being the only Black best actress Oscar winner is 'heartbreaking'
- Halle Berry says her 2002 best actress Oscar win "didn't open the door" for more Black women to win.
- Berry is still the only Black actress to win in the category.
In 2002, Halle Berry made history when she became the first Black actress to win an Oscar in the best actress category. Twenty years later, no other Black actress has won that prize.
"It didn't open the door," Berry told The New York Times this week, looking back on her win. "The fact that there's no one standing next to me is heartbreaking."
Berry's win for her riveting performance as a mother who is grieving over the deaths of her husband and son wasn't just historic but one of the biggest upsets in Oscars history as she beat out the likes of Nicole Kidman ("Moulin Rouge"), Judi Dench ("Iris"), Sissy Spacek ("In the Bedroom"), and Renée Zellweger ("Bridget Jones's Diary").
It led to her having an emotionally powerful acceptance speech, in which she dedicated the win to Dorothy Dandridge, who was the first Black woman nominated for best actress in 1955 for "Carmen Jones."
At the time of her win, Berry was the seventh Black actress to be nominated in the category and since her win, seven more have been nominated. But after Berry's win, a Black actress wasn't a nominee in the category again until Gabourey Sidibe was nominated for "Precious" in 2010.
However, Berry does see progress.
"We can't always judge success or progress by how many awards we have," she told the Times. "Awards are the icing on the cake — they're your peers saying you were exceptionally excellent this year."
She continued: "But does that mean that if we don't get the exceptionally excellent nod, that we were not great, and we're not successful, and we're not changing the world with our art, and our opportunities aren't growing?"
Berry cites the producing work that Lena Waithe and Viola Davis are doing as examples of change. And then, there's what Berry herself has done since winning the Oscar. In November, she made her directorial debut with the Netflix movie "Bruised," in which she also stars playing a MMA fighter looking for a comeback.
"Twenty years ago, a Black woman directing a movie about the fight genre?" she said. "I don't think I could've even wrapped my brain around it. That's proof to me that things are changing."
In 2021, two Black actresses were nominated in the best actress category — Viola Davis for "Ma Rainey's Black Bottom" and Andra Day for "The United States vs. Billie Holiday."
This year's Oscars, which take place on Sunday, do not have any Black actresses as nominees in the best actress category.