- "One Tree Hill" star Bethany Joy Lenz spoke to Variety about her experience in a religious cult.
- She called the unnamed group's leader "sociopathic."
"One Tree Hill" star Bethany Joy Lenz is sharing more about her experiences in an unnamed religious cult.
In a new interview with Variety's TV editor Emily Longeretta, the 42-year-old actor and singer described the leader of the group that she was a member of for 10 years as "sociopathic" and said she was the victim of "spiritual abuse. "
Lenz said that her time in the "Bible-based cult" overlapped with the years she spent playing married high-schooler Haley James Scott on the hit teen drama "One Tree Hill," and that some members of the cast and crew on the show tried to help her recognize the situation she was in and get out.
"For a while, they were all trying to save me and rescue me, which is lovely and so amazing to be cared about in that way," she reflected. "But I was very stubborn. I was really committed to what I believed were the best choices I could make."
Lenz, who also appeared on "Dexter," was purposefully vague about details because she's now writing a book about her experiences, but said groups like the one she was in use "isolation" to "make you distrust everyone around you," which affected her time on "One Tree Hill."
"It built a deep wedge of distrust between me and my cast and crew," she said. "As much as I loved them and cared about them, there was a fundamental thought: If I'm in pain, if I'm suffering, I can't go to any of these people. So you feel incredibly lonely."
Although she couldn't bond with her cast members as deeply as she might have wanted to at the time, Lenz said that "in a lot of ways, 'One Tree Hill' saved my life" because it forced her to live in Wilmington, North Carolina, keeping her at a distance from the group.
Lenz also said she feels "shame" because she followed the teachings of a "sociopathic" leader whom she compared to NXIVM's Keith Raniere. Her involvement also negatively impacted her relationship with her family and her career.
"I was at the height of my career, getting offers for huge movies and Broadway shows. Everything I'd trained for, all my childhood dreams were coming true, and I said no to all of it so I could go live with this remote, small group of people, convinced I was making a noble, spiritual sacrifice," she said.
She didn't elaborate on any experiences she had while living with the religious group, but said that "anyone who kind of went against what I was experiencing in my reality — became a bit of the enemy," comparing how people in the group treated outsiders to Scientology's concept of a "suppressive person."
Lenz said that living the "secret life" while also having a public persona as a celebrity was "painful" for her.
"You hear about, like, Hitler, but nobody thinks that the pastor on the corner is going to be a malignant narcissist who wants to steal all your money and take your soul just for his own kicks," she said.
Earlier this year, Lenz publicly revealed that she was in the cult for the first time on "Drama Queens," her "One Tree Hill" rewatch podcast with Sophia Bush and Hilarie Burton Morgan.
The singer, who just released a new single called "Strawberries," explained that she's now rebuilding her relationship with God based on experiences she had growing up before joining the group.
In Lenz's opinion, there is no way anyone could've prevented her from joining the group when she did. She said that her advice for anyone trying to help a loved one is to "build a trust that feels unbreakable for them" and challenge them when you feel you need to without giving them a reason to cut you out of their lives.