Berry Berenson: Actress, Model, and Photographer
Berry Berenson (April 14, 1948 – September 11, 2001) was an American actress, model, and photographer. She died as a passenger on American Airlines Flight 11 during the September 11 attacks, when the plane crashed into the North Tower of the World Trade Center in New York City.
Early Life and Education
Berinthia Berenson, nicknamed “Berry,” was born on April 14, 1948, in Murray Hill, Manhattan. Her mother, Gogo Schiaparelli, was a socialite of Italian, Swiss, and French ancestry. Her father, Robert Lawrence Berenson, was an American career diplomat who later became a shipping executive; he was of Russian-Jewish and Polish-Jewish descent, with the family’s original surname being Valvrojenski.
Her elder sister Marisa Berenson became a well-known model and actress. Their maternal grandmother was Elsa Schiaparelli, the Italian-born fashion designer, and their maternal grandfather was Wilhelm de Wendt de Kerlor, a Theosophist and psychic medium. The Berenson sisters were great-grandnieces of Giovanni Schiaparelli, an Italian astronomer, and second cousins once removed of art expert Bernard Berenson and his sister Senda Berenson, an athlete and educator who was one of the first two women elected to the Basketball Hall of Fame.
Berenson studied acting at The American Place Theatre in New York with instructor Wynn Handman, alongside Richard Gere, Philip Anglim, Penelope Milford, Robert Ozn, Ingrid Boulting, and her sister Marisa.
Career and Achievements
Following a brief modeling career in the late 1960s, Berenson became a freelance photographer. In 1972, her fiancé Richard Bernstein was hired as the cover artist for Andy Warhol’s Interview magazine. Berenson recruited models for the covers and photographed them, while Bernstein illustrated the images. By 1973, her photographs had been published in Life, Glamour, Vogue, and Newsweek.
As an actress, Berenson starred opposite her husband Anthony Perkins in the 1978 film Remember My Name, directed by Alan Rudolph. She appeared with Jeff Bridges in the 1979 film Winter Kills and with Malcolm McDowell in Cat People (1982).
Notable Events and Milestones
Berenson married Anthony Perkins on August 9, 1973, in Wellfleet, Massachusetts, while three months pregnant. The couple raised two sons: actor-director Osgood Perkins and folk/rock singer-songwriter Elvis Perkins. Perkins died from AIDS-related complications on September 12, 1992, after nearly two decades of marriage.
On September 11, 2001, Berenson was returning home to Los Angeles from a vacation on Cape Cod when she boarded American Airlines Flight 11. The plane was hijacked and deliberately crashed into the North Tower of the World Trade Center. Her remains were never found. At the National September 11 Memorial & Museum, her name is inscribed on Panel N-76 at the North Pool.
Additional Resources
For more detailed information about Berry Berenson’s life, career, and family connections, readers can consult Wikipedia and other biographical archives that document her contributions to photography and film, as well as her family’s significant cultural legacy.
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