Halle’s breakthrough role came in 1991 in Spike Lee’s Jungle Fever. She played Eddie Murphy’s dream girl in Boomerang in 1992.

Her role as the wife of a convicted murderer who falls in love with her husband’s racist prison guard in the movie Monster’s Ball earned Halle an Academy Award for Best Actress, making her the first African American woman to gain this honor.

A low point in her career was when she won the Razzie Award for Worst Actress for her role as Catwoman in 2005.

Halle’s personal life has been less successful. She has been divorced twice, first from David Justice in 1997 and then from Eric Benet in 2005. Her most recent relationship with French-Canadian supermodel Gabriel Aubry resulted in the birth of daughter Nahla Ariela Aubry. When they split a vicious custody battle took place.

• Full name: Maria Halle Berry
• Birth date: August 14, 1966
• Birth place: Cleveland, Ohio