Why John Wick 3’s Halle Berry Had To Miss Two Stunts For The Movie

Halle Berry in John Wick 3 Parabellum
(Image credit: (Lionsgate))

One of the most exciting additions to the John Wick franchise was Halle Berry’s Sofia in last year’s hit film John Wick 3: Chapter 3 - Parabellum. The action series received some good news this week with Lionsgate’s announcement that a fourth and fifth installment will be shot back to back. We don’t know much about what’s next, including whether Berry will return, but she definitely showed she’s game for anything on the set of John Wick 3. Come on, she broke three ribs during rehearsals… she was all in.

Heidi Moneymaker is a prominent stunt performer who has worked alongside Brie Larson for Captain Marvel and Scarlett Johansson for Black Widow, to name a few. When she worked with Halle Berry for John Wick 3, she was especially impressed with how game Berry was. Moneymaker said the 53-year-old actress performed all the stunts except for a couple minor moments. In her words:

Most of my actors have been fairly game to do stuff, but my number one would be Halle Berry, because I trained her for John Wick 3 and we trained together for six months. She went through more than I can even mention here, but was just, no matter what, was 100% in the role, in the character. We were in Morocco during her fight scenes. Her stunt double rehearsed everything, but there were only two parts of that that Halle didn't do. One was a slide under the table because she could potentially cut her face and we didn't want her to do that, and the other was a dog jumping off her back.

Wow! Thinking back to all of John Wick’s badass fight scenes, it's seriously impressive Halle Berry did almost every stunt herself as the assassin. As Moneymaker told Looper, the only exceptions the production had to absolutely make was for two specific parts in the film. When Sofia slid under the table, there was a fear she might slice up her face. And the other one had to do with an especially aggressive dog the production had to place instead of the usual pup.

Heidi Moneymaker said there was worry the dog might get “freaked out” and bite Halle Berry, so she sat out that specific stunt. Other than that though, the stunt performer insisted the actress “did everything’ and was “incredible.” One crazy story Moneymaker brought up about Halle Berry’s commitment to stunt work was for the Boss Bitch Fight Challenge a ton of stars participated in.

During Halle Berry’s bit, she said yes to getting “horse poo” flung at her and being plunged into a pool for the awesome Instagram video with a ton of women doing stunt work, including Heidi Moneymaker. Check it out here:

A photo posted by on

Following her recent role in John Wick 3, Halle Berry has directed her first film called Bruised, in which she stars as an MMA fighter who attempts to restart her athletic career and regain custody of her son. She’s also going to be in Roland Emmerich’s next film Moonfall. Stay tuned here on CinemaBlend for more movie news.

Sarah El-Mahmoud
Staff Writer

Sarah El-Mahmoud has been with CinemaBlend since 2018 after graduating from Cal State Fullerton with a degree in Journalism. In college, she was the Managing Editor of the award-winning college paper, The Daily Titan, where she specialized in writing/editing long-form features, profiles and arts & entertainment coverage, including her first run-in with movie reporting, with a phone interview with Guillermo del Toro for Best Picture winner, The Shape of Water. Now she's into covering YA television and movies, and plenty of horror. Word webslinger. All her writing should be read in Sarah Connor’s Terminator 2 voice over.