Halle Berry has revealed that she broke two of her ribs while she was filming upcoming MMA movie Bruised.
The new film, which is being released on Netflix in November, is the 54-year-old's feature directorial debut. She plays disgraced MMA fighter Jackie Justice, who is fighting for one last chance in the ring.
It used to be when you were 40 your career was done … and I mean really done. I couldn't think that I'd be playing an MMA fighter at 54 years old. Yet I did, so it's got to be changing. I'm proof of that. @EW @netflix pic.twitter.com/TAooS4lJfl
— Halle Berry (@halleberry) August 10, 2021
In an interview with Entertainment Weekly about the movie, stunt coordinator Eric Brown said that Berry broke two ribs on the first day of filming in New Jersey in late 2019 but refused to halt production.
Brown said: "(It was) kind of a crazy injury. But that was just her intensity . . . Halle's a special case. I've worked with tons of actors, and almost none of them have that kind of work ethic."
Oscar winner Berry previously fractured her ribs while filming 2019's John Wick: Chapter 3 - Parabellum, and that experience meant she did things differently on the Bruised set.
"I told the (John Wick) director about it, they told the insurance. We had to shut down for months and it was a big ordeal," she told Entertainment Weekly.
"On this, because it was an independent movie, we didn't have a big budget. The director in me said, 'I didn't come this far and work this hard to go home.'"
Blake Lively was originally set to star in Bruised with Nick Cassavetes directing but those plans fell through and Berry stepped in.
"I went to the producer, Basil Iwanyk, who I'd just done John Wick 3 with, and gave him my pitch. And he said, 'Great, we love that idea. Now go find a director,'" she recalled.
"I had to go back and say, 'I've tried really hard, but what's in my head, no one else sees. This is going to sound really crazy because it's crazy for me to even think it, but I think I should direct this.'"
Bruised is set to be released on Netflix in November 24.
