Monsters Ball - Secrets Behind The Making Of "Monster's Ball"

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Close Casting Calls

Every actress and musician-turned-actress was considered for the role of Leticia. Not everyone…but quite a few. I’m talking about Vanessa Williams, Queen Latifah, Angela Bassett and even Jennifer Lopez. But many of the women had a problem with the sex scene. Angela Bassett was famously quoted when she told Entertainment Weekly: 

”I wasn’t going to be a prostitute on film. I couldn’t do that because it’s such a stereotype about black women and sexuality.” She says, ”Film is forever. It’s about putting something out there you can be proud of 10 years later. I mean, Meryl Streep won Oscars without all that. “

Still, Bassett said that she does not begrudge Berry for her decision to take the role or the success it brought her. In fact, she said she cried when Berry mentioned her in her acceptance speech.

“I can’t and don’t begrudge Halle her success. It wasn’t the role for me, but I told her she’d win, and I told her to go get what was hers. Of course I want one, too. I would love to have an Oscar. But it has to be for something I can sleep with at night.”

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The Denial

Interestingly enough, Daniels, who served as producer of the film, denied that Angela Bassett was ever offered the role… kind of like what he said happened with Mo’Nique and the role of Cookie for “Empire.” Interesting…and really kind of hard to believe considering they seemed to consider everyone.

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…but not Halle 

They wanted everyone except Halle Berry. In a 2002 interview with People, Daniels said that they just thought Berry was too beautiful to play this plagued woman. But when she came in and met with Lee Daniels, she showed her feisty and let him know she was the woman for the job. When he told Berry about their concerns, she said “Who are you to tell me that because I’m too pretty, I can’t do this?” And Lee dug that.

But Berry also had to convince Marc Forster, the director. Berry told Cranky Critic:

“Marc  didn’t want me. That’s all I know. It wasn’t a personal thing. The wonderful thing about Marc is that he had a very clear vision about this movie and the story he wanted to tell. The vision of Leticia he had just was not me. I didn’t quite fit it.

So how did she eventually convince him?

“I just know that I was relentless in my approach. I just wanted a chance to sit in the room and tell him who I thought she was. My take on the movie. How I thought I could breathe life into her. I wanted a chance to tell him all these things that were brewing inside of me and I finally got that chance. And then I met with him a couple of times and then the producer and then Billy Bob until they just gave in.”

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The Sex Scene

The sex scene was a huge point of contention for the other actresses. And even for fans today who still discuss the film. But Berry felt it was integral to the plot. She told an interviewer before the film was released:

I’m praying that audiences will be more sophisticated than to reduce this scene in this movie to the level of the scene in Swordfish. I’m hoping that we are a little more sophisticated than that – but you never know. But I’m hoping. They are clearly polar opposites. One was clearly done for shock value and gratuitous and one is the pivotal vital part of the movie. But I think we approached the scene like every other scene that had heavy strong subject matter. From the abuse of the child to the use of the racial slurs, we dealt with it in the same way. To be true to it to be honest to it. Do those uncomfortable things that sometimes do and feel too risky to say. We just opted at every scene to go ahead and do it. Go ahead. Say the N-word. Do it for real like how people really do, don’t make it pretty for Hollywood.

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How did Eric Benet react to it?

Even though Berry had made peace with the scene, she still had to run it past her husband, at the time, Eric Benet. Berry arranged for the film to be screened privately at her home. This is how she said Benet took it.

“I didn’t want him to see it on premiere night and have some reporter and go, So.. (laughs) It’s hard for any man to see his wife like that but he read the script and said, ‘Oh, you’ve got to do this. He didn’t think about the love scene then because the love scene was just words on paper. When he saw it it was a different deal. But at the end of it he was able to say, ‘I’m really proud of you. You took a risk’. It was tough, but not tougher than when I had to abuse my over weight son. No tougher than that. That was probably tougher than the love scene.”

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The Little Boy

Little Tyrell Musgrove had a hell of a life. In addition to losing his father to the penal system, he struggled with his weight and then eventually was struck and killed by a car. But it wasn’t just his fictional character that was dealing with some challenges. In real life, Coronji Calhoun told Halle Berry that his life wasn’t exactly peaches and cream either. Berry recalled the incident in an interview:

“Marc (the director) and I were talking to him, saying this is just a movie, and I kept saying, everything I do and say, it’s not real. I really think you’re wonderful. And he said, ‘Well, whatever you do to me, Halle Berry, it isn’t going to be worse than what the kids at school do to me.'”

Years after the movie was released, Calhoun was listed as one of the missing children lost during Hurricane Katrina.

But he is very much alive, has an account on Facebook and a son. Here’s what he looks like today.

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The Title

Perhaps this little tidbit is old news to you; but I saw the movie and I didn’t remember this fun fact. As Hank, Billy Bob Thorton, explains to Sonny, Heath Ledger, “monster’s ball” refers to the get-together the men on the execution team have before they take a prisoner to die.

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The Potential Prisoners

The role of Lawrence is a small one. But in many ways his execution is the catalyst for the rest of the action in the film. Not to mention that there is a very powerful speech between Lawrence and his son Tyrell, where he tells him not to be like him because he is the the best of him. The role had to go to the right person. Hollywood greats like Don Cheadle and Jeffrey Wright were considered for the part. But ultimately, it went to Sean “Puff Daddy” (at the time), Combs.

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Diddy

Just like Halle Berry had to defy expectations to get this role, Diddy had to do the same thing. As a producer he said he was offered the types of roles someone in the Hip Hop community is often offered. But he wanted to go the Indie route. When he came across the script for Monster’s Ball, he knew this was it. He went out  for the role…but couldn’t even audition. So naturally, he didn’t get it. But his acting coach told him that he needed to fight and use his resources to get the part. Diddy hopped on his private jet and flew to Halle Berry’s hotel room and gave her a very convincing spiel.

In an interview for “Inside the Actor’s Studio,” he recalled the conversation:

“I knocked on Halle’s door at a hotel and she was like ‘Whatchu doing here?’ I was like ‘Give me five minutes. Do you remember when people just looked at you as you was just a pretty face, remember in “Strictly Business”? And nobody would give you that chance? I know you may think that I’m going to be polarizing, that I’m going to take your shot to win an Oscar but I’m going to help you win the Oscar. Cuz I’m going to believable. Just give me a chance. I got to read for the part the next day and they gave me the part.”

You can watch the full explanation in the video below.

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The Realness

The director, Marc Forster, in preparation for the film, wanted to know what it was like to sit in that electric chair. When he did so, he was horrified to see that the prisoners who had been electrocuted involuntarily scratched into the wood, leaving nail marks on the arm rests.

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Reception

When the movie, which cost $4 million to make, was first released in lat fall 2001, it showed on just seven screens in the United States.  The film was re-released a few months later in 2002. Y’all know it was a hit. It grossed over $44 million at the box office in the U.S. alone and Roger Ebert called it one of the best movies of 2001. The film, its writers and the cast were nominated for and won several awards. Berry took home the SAG Award, a National Board of Review award, a Black Reel Award, a Silver Bear and, most memorably, the Academy Award.