“Being a shaman and marrying a member of the royal family is very, very surreal,” an exceedingly candid shaman named Durek Verrett, who last year married Princess Märtha Louise of Norway, says in the new Netflix documentary Rebel Royalty: An Unusual Love Story.
Filmed in the months leading up to their August 2024 wedding, the film is the couple’s attempt to reclaim the narrative about their love story after years dodging quite critical tabloid headlines about their romance. It offers a rare and frank window into the pair’s private life, featuring several on-camera statements from the newlyweds across the nearly 100-minute runtime.
In addition to the more colorful aspects of Princess Märtha Louise and Verrett, the documentary also delves into more sobering topics—like the racism Verrett has faced in the spotlight. After Harry and Meghan’s bombshell interview with Oprah in 2021 where they aired similar experiences, Märtha Louise’s father King Harald asked Verrett, “Do you think we treated you like that?” the shaman recounts in the film. “When I told him yes, they called a family meeting [to sort things out].” The monarch later publicly condemned the racist remarks lobbied against his son-in-law. Says Märtha Louise in the doc: “My parents have always been willing to learn and adapt.”
The documentary also explores the origins of Märtha Louise and Verrett’s headline-making love story. Norway’s princess, fourth in line to the Norwegian throne, had been divorced for a couple of years from Ari Behn (whose subsequent tragic death and previous relationship are also covered in the documentary); and the shaman was famous for working with the likes of Gwyneth Paltrow when they first crossed paths. The royal’s three daughters with Behn recount that when their mother introduced them to Verrett, they thought he was “one of her gay friends.” The shaman defines himself as bisexual and “almasexual,” explaining, “I am attracted to people’s souls.” In the case of Märtha Louise, “I didn’t care which body she came in,” he says. “I fell in love with the person.” Adds Märtha Louise: “I am a Scorpio, and when I fall in love it is for life.”
The woo-woo platitudes don’t end there. Verrett also claims that his wife “has psychic abilities” and is “a bit of a witch.” For her part, Märtha Louise says that when they finally met—she began sending him messages on the recommendation of a mutual friend, because of the “energies” they shared—the shaman told her that “we were destined to meet and I rolled my eyes. Inside,” she adds with a grin, “because I am a very educated princess.”
The princess is also open about her difficulty fitting into the royal family as a child. “Being misunderstood is the story of my life,” she says. “I realized I was a princess when I sometimes had to wear different clothes in uncomfortable situations: sit properly, eat properly. I hated that whole environment. I don’t look anything like the rest of my family.”
The couple revealed their relationship to the world “without telling their PR teams,” as Verrett’s niece and manager Natalia Avala recounts in the film. And, although Märtha Louise tried to warn the shaman, “it’s not the press you’re used to,” the shock of what awaited Verrett in Norway was tremendous. In addition to the social codes of the Norwegian people, the difficulty of existing in the royal structure amid the constant press coverage took its toll on the couple. Some media “believed he was a swindler coming to get her using black magic,” Verrett recalls. “They didn’t want a black, bisexual shaman marrying their princess.”
Within the royal family, the situation wasn’t much better. Märtha Louise’s mother Queen Sonia “worried that dating a shaman was very much breaking out of the mold,” the princess recalls. That feeling only intensified when Verrett met the royal family for the first time. Märtha Louise advised that her now-husband be himself, however, “when I met the king and queen they stared at me in stony silence,” Verrett says in the film. “I was wearing a kimono and cowboy boots. I didn’t know I was supposed to wear a suit.”
Originally published in Vanity Fair España
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