In an exclusive extract from her forthcoming memoir, Game of Thrones star Hannah Murray has described the depths of a psychotic episode that led to her being sectioned under the Mental Health Act. The actor, best known for playing Gilly in the HBO fantasy series, recounts being admitted to a psychiatric hospital and believing she was a 'Ritual Master' with superhuman powers.
Murray writes that during the episode she thought she was 'the saviour of the planet' and 'the girl with all the gifts'. She describes urinating into a cup and drinking it as a 'powerful ritual', and pacing hospital corridors delivering what she calls 'the greatest performance of my life'. The actor recalls being told she was being sectioned for 28 days under Section 2 of the Mental Health Act, but says she was 'not concerned', focused instead on 'the energy I can feel spiralling up through my body and the voices I can hear in my head'.
In the extract, Murray also describes a phone call with her mother, whom she believed she was hearing for the last time. 'This is the last time I will ever hear her voice, I think. This is the way I say goodbye,' she writes. The actor, who also appeared in the film Detroit, says she believed the show's creators David Benioff and Dan Weiss, along with director Kathryn Bigelow, were 'the four horsemen of the apocalypse' who had cast her in roles that brought about her destiny.
Murray's memoir, from which this extract is taken, is set to be published later this year. The actor has previously spoken about her mental health struggles, but this is the first time she has detailed the psychotic episode that led to her hospitalisation.
