Some of Hollywood’s most famous faces lived through unconventional experiences in tight-knit communities they later described as “cult-like” — and they haven’t been afraid to talk about it.
Whether it was a “bible-based” group that swallowed up a decade of one star’s life, or a fundamentalist upbringing that spawned a hit reality show, the following stars are pulling back the curtain on the allegedly controlling communities they once called home.
Keep scrolling to see which stars have discussed their experiences in a cult:
Bethany Joy Lenz Spent 10 Years in The Big House Family
The One Tree Hill alum dropped a bombshell on her “Drama Queens” podcast in July 2023, revealing that she was “in a cult for 10 years.”
Lenz explained that she joined The Big House Family a year or two after landing her role on the WB drama in 2003 — and she even married the cult leader’s son. Lenz told Variety that filming in North Carolina gave her “spatial separation” from the “bible-based cult,” allowing her to later spill every detail in her October 2024 memoir, Dinner for Vampires.
Noah Lyles Reveals a Strict Religious Upbringing
Fresh off his gold-medal moment in the men’s 100-meter final at the 2024 Paris Olympics (plus bronze in the 200-meter), Lyles got real on the “Everybody Wants to Be Us” podcast about the strict religious group that shaped his childhood.
“All the moms had to be homeschooling their kids and the father was the head of the household, and the church told you who you could date, who you couldn’t date,” Lyles shared.
His family eventually relocated to North Carolina — only to discover another church angling for the same kind of control.
Christine Brown Says ‘Sister Wives’ Was a Cult
In her 2025 memoir, Sister Wife: A Memoir of Faith, Family and Finding Freedom, Brown declared that her fundamentalist polygamist Mormon upbringing — and the family she built with ex Kody Brown — ventured into cult-like territory.
“I believe I grew up in a cult. I believe I raised my children in a cult,” Christine wrote.
The wake-up call? Daughter Gwendlyn told her that girls at church camp had zero interest in college — they just wanted babies. Christine split from Kody in November 2020 and is now in a happily monogamous relationship married to David Woolley.
India Oxenberg Opens Up About Life After NXIVM
Oxenberg told Us Weekly exclusively in 2024 that she feels “additional pressure” raising a daughter after her time in NXIVM, the infamous “self-help” group later exposed to be an illegal sex-cult.
Oxenberg was groomed inside the secret society “DOS” by founder Keith Raniere, who was sentenced to 120 years in prison in 2020 on charges including sex trafficking, racketeering conspiracy and forced labor conspiracy.
She escaped in 2018 and bared it all in her 2020 memoir Still Learning and the docuseries Seduced: Inside the NXIVM Cult.
Joaquin Phoenix’s Family History With Children of God
Joaquin Phoenix’s parents joined Children of God in the 1970s, dragging him and his late brother River Phoenix across Central and South America with the group.
“Cults rarely advertise themselves as such,” Joaquin told Playboy in 2014. “I think the moment my parents realized there was something more to it, they got out.”
He called his family’s involvement “really innocent,” contrasting it with Rose McGowan’s far more traumatic experience after the group’s 1980s reorganization.
Emily Watson, Glenn Close and Caleb Simpson Speak Out
Dune: Prophecy star Emily Watson grew up in the School of Economic Science (SES), a worldwide organization said to offer “non-academic” philosophy courses.
“I learned to concentrate out of fear,” Emily told Vulture in 2024. SES expelled her at 29 after she filmed 1996’s “Breaking the Waves.”
Glenn Close was in the Moral Re-Armament, a so-called “spiritual and moral” movement founded by Frank N.D. Buchman, from age 7 until 22. The group preached four “absolutes” needed for “personal transformation” — honesty, purity, unselfishness and love.
“You basically weren’t allowed to do anything, or you were made to feel guilty about any unnatural desire,” Glenn told The Hollywood Reporter in 2014, saying that her time in the group had “a profound impact.”
TikTok real estate star Caleb Simpson alleged in an April 2026 video that his dad created a cult-like environment during his childhood.
“Me and my siblings joke around that we were involved in a cult with no followers because my dad believed that he was chosen by God,” he said.
‘RHOBH’ Newbie Amanda Frances Joins the Conversation
Real Housewives of Beverly Hills season 15 newcomer Amanda Frances told Us Weekly she spent two years “very highly involved in a church that I consider to be a cult.”
The drama spilled onto the show after Dorit Kemsley unearthed Amanda’s October 2015 blog post about leaving. “It fits all the criteria for a cult. It fits all the criteria for religious abuse,” Amanda said.
