Bellator women’s bantamweight Cat Zingano is taking movie star Halle Berry to court over a promised movie role in Berry’s movie Bruised.
Zingano, was with the UFC at the time, alleges in the lawsuit – which was obtained by TMZ – that in July 2019, Berry offered a movie role in her directorial debut movie Bruised, which required her to refuse an October 2019 UFC fight as Berry said for insurance reasons.
After refusing the fight, the UFC released Zingano in August 2019.
“Zingano was torn between the significantly valuable career-advancing opportunity to fight for title contention, and the once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to be involved with Defendant Berry in a feature film about a character whose story so closely mirrored Zingano’s own life story,” the lawsuit said.
Bruised debuted at the Toronto International Film Festival in September 2020. It is set to appear on Netflix on November 24.
After 3 years in the making, I am THRILLED to finally announce “Bruised” is coming to @netflix globally Nov. 24. This project is so special to me, not only because it’s my directorial debut, but because the fight game, especially MMA, is a sport that I absolutely love (1/2) pic.twitter.com/tHNVyZ5E4G
— Halle Berry (@halleberry) August 5, 2021
Berry informed Zingano two weeks after her UFC release that she could not appear in the film because only UFC fighters could participate and then cut off further communication.
Zingano debuted with Bellator MMA in September 2020, defeating Gabby Holloway by decision at Bellator 245.
There is a specific claim of “promissory estoppel” – Berry’s promise of the movie role to Zingano when she turned down the UFC fight.
The allegations have not yet been proven in court.
Berry and her team have currently declined all media requests for comment on the case.
