Halle Berry delivers rousing speech accepting the SeeHer Award at Critics Choice Awards

Halle Berry has another trophy for her awards shelf. At the 2022 Critics Choice Awards, the Oscar winner accepted the SeeHer Award, honoring women who advocate for gender equality, portray characters with authenticity, defy stereotypes, and push boundaries.

Berry thanked Issa Rae, who presented her with the award, saying, "You have inspired me since the moment you showed up. You have rearranged the way we see ourselves as women of color on television and in the world, and I thank you from my heart."

The Bruised star and director then detailed reading the script about a disgraced female MMA fighter, realizing that "it wasn't written for someone that looked like me. "

"So I went to the producers and I said, 'Why not me? Why can't it be a Black woman?' They said, 'Why not?'" Berry said. When it came time to find a director, she posed the same question, and received the same answer. Why not, indeed.

Later, when Berry asked a viewer about his reactions to Bruised, and he voiced how uncomfortable he was watching a woman getting "battered and beaten," she realized why she had to make the movie in the first place.

"If you had a hard time, if it made you uncomfortable watching that story," Berry said in her speech, "imagine being that woman living that story. This is the power of storytelling."

Berry emphasized the importance of embracing that discomfort in order to see each other's realities. And the reality of her being a Black woman meant that her preconceived notions — that if she could play the part of a white man she would be "winning" — ultimately proved false.

"You wanna know why that didn't work?" Berry asked the crowd gathered at the Fairmont Century Plaza Hotel. "Because if you haven't noticed, I'm not a white man!"

"This is why," Berry concluded her speech, "I am so grateful to be standing and living in this moment where women are standing up and we are telling our own stories. Because we will write, we will produce, we will direct, and if we're brave enough, we will star in it — all at the same time!"

She continued, "We are confident and we are scared. We are vulnerable and we are strong. We are beautiful and we are bruised. We are everything and all of that, and all at the same time!"

Denying that complexity denies our very identity, Berry said, adding that stories that are honest and true, no matter how uncomfortable, are the stories "we have to fight to tell" and the stories the world needs to see.

Directing her comments to "every little girl who feels unseen and unheard," Berry proclaimed, "This is our way of saying to you: We love you and we see you. And you deserve every good thing in this world."

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