Actors Who Accepted Their Razzie Awards: Berry, Bullock, Verhoeven & More

Actors who accepted their Razzie awards are a tiny club in Hollywood lore — because the Golden Raspberry Awards exist to roast the year’s worst film work, and most honorees simply ignore the invitation. Founded by publicist John Wilson in 1980, the Razzies traditionally land the night before the Oscars, spray-painting $4.97 trophies and staging a deliberately low-budget counter-program to Academy prestige. Yet a handful of stars, directors, and writers leaned in: they showed up at the Ivar Theatre, unrolled their own red carpets, held Oscar statuettes in the other hand, or demanded their raspberry on late-night TV. This evergreen Pillar G history explainer maps every verified acceptance — from the first televised trophy handoff in 1988 through Sandra Bullock’s Oscar-and-Razzie weekend in March 2010 and remote video acceptances in the 2020s — with cross-links to sibling coverage, not red-carpet outfit breakdowns (Pillar F owns fashion analysis).

Start with our Razzie Awards 2026 worst picture winners guide for the latest dishonors, then return here for the rare good-sport club who actually collected their golden raspberries in person or on camera.

Actors Who Accepted Their Razzie Awards: Why Showing Up Is the Exception

Understanding actors who accepted their Razzie awards requires understanding what the ceremony is not. The Golden Raspberry Foundation does not broadcast a glittering ABC telecast; it rents indie venues (Hollywood’s Ivar Theatre for many cycles), sells cheap seats, and hands out trophies Wilson once described as worth less than five dollars apiece. Winners are chosen by paid members of the Golden Raspberry Award Foundation — bad-movie enthusiasts, not studio voters — and the tone is roast-first, not red-carpet reverence. That is why Paul Verhoeven’s 1996 appearance for Showgirls drew standing ovations: he treated the room as comedy partners, not enemies.

The pattern repeats across decades. Acceptors usually arrive with a joke ready, sometimes a prop (Tom Green’s harmonica, Sandra Bullock’s DVD stack), and almost always a self-deprecating line that generates more headlines than the film that lost. For the full opposite side of the ledger — who actually won the real Oscars the next night — see our Oscar winners 2026 full list and archive of Awards coverage on USA Celebs.

The First Acceptances: Television Stages Before the Ivar Theatre

The earliest chapter in actors who accepted their Razzie awards did not happen inside the Razzies’ own room. At the 8th Golden Raspberry Awards in 1988, Bill Cosby swept Worst Picture, Worst Actor, and Worst Screenplay for Leonard Part 6 — and publicly complained the foundation’s spray-painted trophies were not golden enough. Wilson’s one-room operation initially balked, but Cosby insisted: if you call someone “worst,” you owe a real prize. Fox’s The Late Show staged the handoff with custom 24-carat gold and Italian marble trophies costing nearly $30,000; Cosby later displayed one on The Tonight Show. Cosby became the first recipient to claim a Razzie, though not at the foundation’s ceremony.

Other pre-Ivar acceptances followed on talk circuits. Tom Selleck collected Worst Supporting Actor for Christopher Columbus: The Discovery on The Chevy Chase Show in 1993. Alan Menken and lyricist Jack Feldman won Worst Original Song for Newsies that same year; Menken eventually filmed an official acceptance video in 2019, proud to hold a Razzie beside his Oscar and Tony for the stage adaptation. Brian Helgeland accepted Worst Screenplay for The Postman in 1998 at his Warner Bros. office — the same weekend he won the Academy Award for L.A. Confidential, a quixotic double that Sandra Bullock would later echo.

Paul Verhoeven and Tom Green: In-Person Chaos at the Ceremony

Paul Verhoeven rewrote the playbook for actors who accepted their Razzie awards on March 24, 1996, at the Hollywood Roosevelt Hotel. He became the first person to attend the ceremony itself, accepting Worst Picture and Worst Director for Showgirls. Verhoeven told the crowd he had been driven from the Netherlands for being “sick and perverted and disgusting,” then joked that seven Razzies in one night beat reading September reviews. The audience stood twice — proof that showing up converts ridicule into cult legend.

Tom Green matched that energy at the 22nd Golden Raspberry Awards on March 23, 2002. His Freddy Got Fingered swept five categories; Green unrolled a cheap red carpet as he entered, mocked fellow nominees from the stage, and refused to stop playing harmonica until organizers dragged him off. It remains the purest distillation of Razzie absurdism — and a reminder that actors who accepted their Razzie awards often generate more cultural memory than the films being punished. For trophy-material context across ceremonies, see what are award trophies made of and worth.

Halle Berry at the 25th Razzies: Oscar in One Hand, Raspberry in the Other

No survey of actors who accepted their Razzie awards is complete without Halle Berry on February 26, 2005, at Hollywood’s Ivar Theatre. Catwoman had dominated the 25th Golden Raspberry Awards with Worst Picture, Worst Director (Pitof), Worst Screenplay, and Worst Actress — and Berry stunned the room by appearing in person. Holding her Academy Award for Monster’s Ball in one hand and her spray-painted raspberry in the other, she parodied her Oscar speech: “Thank you so much. I never in my life thought I would be up here.” She thanked Warner Bros. for “a godawful piece of s— movie,” dragged her manager onstage, and confirmed the trophy bore her name — she would not have to return it.

Co-screenwriter Michael Ferris also accepted Worst Screenplay that night, crediting the Razzies for boosting Catwoman DVD sales. Julie Newmar collected Worst Picture on behalf of the franchise’s legacy Catwoman — told she remained “the best Catwoman.” Berry’s appearance helped fund future ceremonies: Ben Affleck’s destroyed 2004 trophy was auctioned on eBay for $967.97, with proceeds renting the Ivar for the 2005 show Berry attended. Pair this history with Razzie Awards 2026 worst picture winners for how the foundation names today’s flops.

Sandra Bullock, J. David Shapiro, and the Oscar-Razzie Double Weekend

March 6, 2010, belongs in any timeline of actors who accepted their Razzie awards. At the 30th Golden Raspberry Awards, Sandra Bullock won Worst Actress and Worst Screen Couple for All About Steve — and she had telegraphed her attendance days earlier, joking that in Hollywood you only win if you promise to show up. Bullock brought DVD copies for voters, threatened a full script reading, and escaped a Jeffrey Katzenberg charity dinner to make the stage time. Organizers would not let her leave with the sole trophy on hand; the next night she won the Academy Award for Best Actress for The Blind Side, joining Alan Menken and Brian Helgeland in the tiny club of Oscar-and-Razzie same-weekend winners (for different films).

Screenwriter J. David Shapiro also accepted at that 2010 ceremony, collecting Worst Picture of the Decade for Battlefield Earth — his second Razzie handshake after a 2001 radio-show delivery for Worst Screenplay, where he quoted John Travolta calling the script “the Schindler’s List of science fiction.” Shapiro read a New York Times review from the podium: “Battlefield Earth is about the extinction of the human race, and after seeing this movie I’m all for it.” Years later Bullock left Dakota Johnson a voicemail welcoming her to the “Razzie club” after Madame Web — proof the good-sport network persists offstage.

Remote Acceptances and the Modern Razzie Club

The roster of actors who accepted their Razzie awards expanded beyond the Ivar footlights in the 2010s and 2020s. David Eigenberg filmed a humorous Sex and the City 2 acceptance video in 2011 after telling Wilson he had never won anything. Jamie Dornan received his Fifty Shades of Grey trophies on Conan in February 2018, reattaching a broken top on air. Dinesh D’Souza mocked political outrage in the foundation’s 2017 winner video for Hillary’s America. Dwayne Johnson posted a Twitter video accepting Baywatch’s “So Rotten You Loved It” special award in 2018. Francis Ford Coppola accepted Worst Director for Megalopolis via Instagram in February 2025; Lady Gaga referenced her Worst Screen Combo win during a March 2025 Saturday Night Live monologue for Joker: Folie à Deux.

Ben Affleck’s 2004 Larry King Live destruction of his Gigli trophy — after complaining on radio he was “stiffed” — counts as acceptance by spectacle even if he did not attend the ceremony. Uwe Boll filmed a Darfur-set acknowledgment in 2009; Alan Menken’s 2019 video closed a decades-long gap. The through-line: actors who accepted their Razzie awards treat the raspberry as a punchline they co-own, not a career tombstone. For broader worst-picture context each season, bookmark Razzie Awards 2026 worst picture winners and our Awards hub.

Explore More Pillar G Awards History on USA Celebs

• Latest dishonors: Razzie Awards 2026 worst picture winners.
• Oscar contrast: Oscar winners 2026 full list, actors who never won an Oscar.
• Trophy lore: what are award trophies made of and worth.
• Ratings context: why award show ratings are declining.
• Archive: Awards category on USA Celebs.