Bertice Berry stands in the middle of her living room and proclaims: “I am the best shopper in the world. I’ll challenge anyone when it comes to shopping. I can go into a place, take a quick survey and know exactly what I want. And I only buy bargains.”
Take the long, squooshy white sofa that curves around one end of her living room.
“That’s from when Colby’s (Home Furnishings) was closing, everything was on sale. It had been reduced by $7,000. I said, `No, that’s not enough, go lower.’ They said they couldn’t, and I said, `OK, no sale,’ and I started to leave. They came after me, saying, `No, no, wait, what sounds good to you?’ They finally came down by $8,500 (to $15,000).”
It’s obvious that Berry, 33, with a Ph.D. in sociology, a career as lecturer and stand-up comedian, and now the host of the “Bertice Berry Show” (10 a.m. weekdays on WFLD-Ch. 32), does not need to pinch pennies.
One look around her white-carpeted two-story Streeterville apartment that perches 48 floors above Lake Michigan is enough to confirm that Berry is doing well.
“It’s where I’m from,” she says. “I grew up poor. You don’t forget that. I don’t want to forget that.”
The sixth of seven children and the only one to go to college, it’s clear that growing up poor in Wilmington, Del., is key to what Berry does and how she lives.
Shopping for bargains is just part of it.
“I worked at shelters for battered women and rape victims (during and after her undergraduate years at Jacksonville University), and that’s important, but for me, it was like just trying to put a Band-Aid on cancer. So I decided I wanted to get into the research side of things, why things are the way they are.” That’s what led to her master’s and Ph.D. in sociology and teaching at Kent State University in Ohio. She taught until 1986, when she turned to stand-up comedy full-time.
“Sociology analyzes everyday, mundane matters. Comedy does the same thing, and a talk show just takes that same (concept) to the edge. People want to talk about issues that affect them in everyday life.”
Instant parenthood
Berry, slightly under 5 feet, 2 inches tall and down more than 100 pounds from the 250 she weighed a few years ago, as effervescent as an Alka-Seltzer, with bright red lipstick and an equally red jacket, is sitting on that squooshy white sofa as she talks.
It’s not quite as white as when she bought it. She became an instant parent last spring, when she gained legal custody of her sister’s three children.
“Look at that, it’s beet juice,” she says, pointing to a stain. “My sister is sick and couldn’t take care of the kids-they’re 8, 2 and 7 months. All of a sudden, I had this new show and three little children, all at the same time.
“I always said I would never spoil children. But you know what I’m doing? I’m spoiling them.”
Another sister, Christine, who was working as a page at the studio, now stays home full-time with the children. Berry sees the kids whenever possible during the week, and spends most weekends with them.
“And, I wanted my mom to come live with us too. She’s 75 and she still works almost every day, coordinating events for seniors, but she (Berry’s mother) said, `Well, I like to wash dishes without wearing any clothes,’ so that ended that idea.”
Personal preferences
Berry likes her apartment, beet juice stains and all.
“I look for bargains, but everything’s been picked out carefully. When I was a kid, I had wish books with pictures (from magazines) of how I wanted my place to look some day.
“I like clean, clear, crisp lines, open space, but space that’s still expressive and friendly. Contemporary but warm. You could probably call it Frank Lloyd Wright Illegitimate. And functional, I don’t like a lot of stuff that’s just stuff and needs dusting all the time. I don’t collect anything, that locks you into stuff.”
The coffee table is an oblong piece of glass resting on the hands of a kneeling man made of wood. “We take the glass off a lot now so the kids don’t bump into it. . . . I got the table at Pier 1, it was on sale because one of his legs is chipped but, look, you can’t see that, can you?”
She chose her Mission-style dining room set with its cushioned chairs because of its look and comfort, she says. “I like people to linger over dinner, I love cooking for my friends. Big meals, slap-your-Mama meals. Not gourmet, but things like fried chicken, home-cooking. I like my big (all-white) kitchen, because I like people out here, participating.
“And I never use a dishwasher. To me, washing and drying the dishes is as much a part of a meal as eating. I like the conversation to continue while everyone does the dishes.”
Thoughtful art
The art pieces all have significance to Berry.
Several Egyptian pieces-a sculpture of King Tut on a lion, and another of King Tut’s tomb-“remind me that I’m a descendent of something more than slaves.” A couple of large sculptures were done by Luther Jones, a Minnesota artist who was sponsored for a time by San Diego philanthropist Terry Evenson, the man who financed the scholarship that put Berry through undergraduate school and helped pay for her graduate studies and who now serves as her business manager.
Photographs hanging in the hallway are by a woman who was assigned by a newspaper to “take pictures showing poverty in Allentown (Pa.), but instead, she showed family-they’re poor families, but they’re families. The paper didn’t use them, and I wanted them.”
Bedtime stories
Three bedrooms and two baths are upstairs and her bedroom is the one place where she didn’t go after bargains.
The futon on a platform bed was custom-made and she shopped for her kente cloth bedsheets all over the country.
“Literally, all over the country. I found the comforter first, and then I found out the line had been discontinued. So I started going into every outlet store, wherever I was-that’s when I was traveling all the time-looking for these discontinued pieces. I never did find a top sheet, but I found a duvet cover and split it and made it into a top sheet.”
She sleeps in sweats, facing East-behind the bed are windows overlooking the lake, and in front of her bed are large glass doors that are controlled with a remote control. The television and closets are behind the doors. Shelves jammed with books line one side of the room.
Five hours of sleep is a full night’s rest for her, and she starts almost every day at 5 a.m., working out with her personal trainer.
Rub-a-dub-dub
She also cleans the bathroom every morning and often the kitchen. “I have someone who comes in and cleans once a week, but the bathroom, that’s every day. I use a rag for the floor. I don’t believe in mops. Every morning, yes, the bathroom must be cleaned, whatever bathroom is used. I’m very neat, I get that from my mother, I mean, when there are seven kids in the family, there are lots of germs and you have to be neat. So that’s the way I am.”
But, yes, of course, she says, kids do clutter and that’s fine. That’s the way they are.
“They’re just children, mess is going to happen. I was thinking about that white sofa last weekend, and I thought maybe I’d replace it. Like when the youngest gets to be 15.”
