Berry battles film race 'issue'

Halle Berry is currently pregnant with her first child

Actress Halle Berry has said race is still an "issue" in Hollywood - but that things are changing "slowly".

Despite being the first black woman to win an Oscar for best actress in 2002, she told the Reuters agency she still had to persuade studios of her ability.

She said she "had to try so hard to be considered", adding: "I should have to stop convincing studios I am right for it, it should be on my acting merit."

Her latest film, Things We Lost in the Fire, is out in the US on 19 October.

In it, she plays a widowed mother of two who asks her husband's friend, played by Benicio Del Toro, to live with them.

'Doesn't matter'

When the film's director Susanne Bier first approached her, Berry said: "Do you care that I am black because this wasn't written for a black woman?"

Bier replied: "To hell with what colour you are, it doesn't matter."

Berry has starred in several blockbuster films, including X-Men and Catwoman, as well as her Oscar-winning performance in Monster's Ball.

In September, the actress announced she was expecting her first child with partner Gabriel Aubry.