Game Of Thrones and Skins star Hannah Murray has sworn off therapy after being lured into a ‘wellness cult’, which she feared was a ‘sex cult’.
The actress, 36, has spoken candidly about escaping the cult, which she has chosen to keep anonymous, after suffering mental health issues led to her being recruited with an array of expensive inductions.
Hannah, who played Gilly on the hit HBO fantasy series, spoke to The Guardian about her trauma, which she discusses in her upcoming book titled The Make-Believe: A Memoir of Magic and Madness which hits shelves next month.
As well as the impact on her mental health, the star detailed how being introduced to an ‘energy healer,’ whom she refers to as Grace, through her personal trainer while filming 2017 film Detroit she was lured into expensive classes and therapies.
After suffering a psychotic break, she managed to escape the grasps of the leader – who she reveals made her fear the organisation was ‘a sex cult’ – yet has sworn off therapy as: ‘Wellness culture is causing things it’s meant to cure’.
After the session, she revealed Grace gave a bottle of ‘drops’ which she insisted were incredibly important. Hannah recalls: ‘[They were most] likely nothing more than water, prettily packaged, harmlessly useless, deceitfully overpriced.’
Once she returned the UK, she spent £700 ($945) on yet more classes, this time from Grace’s English counterpart Siobhan, who Hannah admits she does not think was a conwoman but merely ‘guileless true believer’.
Speaking about the structure of the cult, she writes in her book: ‘The pyramid was structured to exploit everyone who tried to climb it. Except for one person, one man, who sat at the very top.’
She spoke of how Steve’s sex jokes made her wonder if she was in ‘a sex cult’ but after voicing this to a teacher, they replied: ‘Oh my God, that’s hilarious. No, he’s just really good at breaking down your ego and so a lot of sexual stuff might come up.’
Hannah relayed: ‘My own experience felt highly eroticised, without anything explicitly physical happening. There was just this charge to the energy in the room. I think there often is in these hierarchical spiritual organisations….
‘I found it interesting that it was a primarily quite female space – the teachers, the healer – and then this man walks in and he’s incredibly confident and magnetic…
‘The first thing he says is a joke about sex. From this quite floaty, quite gentle, wishy-washy energy, it was suddenly, like, ‘Hey, I’m here,’ and, ‘Let’s f**k.’ I think he was doing that deliberately.’
It was only then she realised the teachers were mostly women and the followers were instructed to wear skirts.
Things began to come into perspective for Hannah when during a course at a London hotel, she recalled her behaviour becoming more manic and erratic. She remembered suffering pain in her head,that felt like she was ‘giving birth through my skull.’
She went to a bathroom stall and was soon surrounded by other members who chanted at her, saying, ‘Be gone, evil spirit in Hannah.’
Hellbound and Down 