Halle Berry's Version of Method Acting Includes Skinning Squirrels to Create Nightmare Fuel for Her Kids

"This gave me an opportunity to be a part of a world I had never seen before."

While some actors go full-on method by changing their voice (see: Austin Bulter's take on Elvis) or just being cruel 24/7 (see: Meryl Streep for The Devil Wears Prada), Halle Berry got down and dirty — literally. For her new horror flick, Never Let Go, she learned how to skin a squirrel and, in the process, created a film that she's positive will give her son nightmares. She shares a daughter, Nahla Ariela Aubry, with ex Gabriel Aubry, and a son, Maceo-Robert Martinez, whom she shares with her ex-husband Olivier Martinez. According to Deadline, the film is "a freaky tale about a mother and her fraternal twins who have never gone beyond their forested environs: Whenever they leave the cabin, they are bounded by rope as they venture into the scary woods." Entertainment Weekly notes that the family is "haunted by an evil entity," which may or may not explain those ropes.

"My 16-year-old [daughter], yeah. My son would have nightmares for a very long time, so no," she told Extra at CinemaCon when she was asked whether or not her kids would enjoy the film. "I mean, he saw a trailer of, like, a scary movie, and it took us a year to get him to go to bed by himself, so he won’t be seeing it.”

She added that her daughter, Nahla, is "going to like this."

“I love, you know, feeling on the edge of my seat and not knowing what’s going to happen, and I love the vast worlds of horror movies," she continued. "You can really play in that world.”

Related: Halle Berry Is Fine With Aging, but She's "Going Down Fighting"

As for making the film, Berry explained that she embraced the grit and grime, even going so far as to learn how to live off the land.

"There was no electricity, no lights, my character skinning squirrels," Berry explained to EW. "And they're eating bugs and frogs — raw frogs — in the woods. It was a challenge ... a little bit of method acting. I had to really skin a squirrel. These things wildly challenged me to create some reality within this world that felt so foreign."

She doubled down on her love of thrills and chills, saying that she's never one to turn down a rush, so diving deep into her role was something she embraced.

"I am a bonafide adrenaline junkie," she said. "The bigger the rollercoaster, the bigger the bungee jump, the longer the zipline, I'm your girl. This gave me an opportunity to be a part of a world I had never seen before."

In addition to giving Berry a chance to try something new — she is, of course, more well-known for acting in dramas, not horror movies — she also saw it as a way to explore what it means to be a mom.

“It was a creepy environment," she said, adding that the movie "reminded me how I would protect my children with my life. "

"What would you do to protect your children? This role gave me a chance to really take that to the limit," she finished.

Never Let Go arrives in theaters on Sept. 27. 

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