Elizabeth Smart: Time is right for sharing my story At a glance

“I Am Elizabeth Smart” will be shown at 8 tonight on Lifetime.

BEVERLY HILLS, Calif. — It was 15 years ago that the teenager Elizabeth Smart was abducted from her home in Utah in the middle of the night.

For nine months, she was held captive by an ersatz holy man and his wife and subjected to torture, rape and attempts at brainwashing.

The true version of the ordeal will be revealed Saturday in a docu-drama premiering on Lifetime. Unlike earlier attempts, this project, “I Am Elizabeth Smart,” arrives with Smart’s participation and her blessings.

She not only serves as a producer but also provides the show’s narration.

“When I got home, I swore up and down that I was never going to write a book, I was never going to do a movie. I wanted it all to disappear,” Smart said during a recent interview.

“I wanted it all to go away, and, honestly, I think that’s a pretty natural response. And for years I felt that way.

Then, gradually, Smart became involved in advocacy, she said.

“I started meeting more survivors and meeting other people who had gone through similar things. ... I realized that I have an opportunity. I have a unique opportunity to share my story because there are so many other survivors out there who struggle every day because they feel like they are alone.”

Smart felt desperately alone when Brian David Mitchell and his wife, Wanda Barzee, imprisoned the 14-year-old in a mountain campsite where they sometimes forced her into a pit covered with boards or chained her to a tree.

Smart says throughout the incarceration that her religion and family background helped fortify her.

“It never changed my view on God because (during) the 14 years prior to that, I’d always been told: ‘You’ll know a person by their actions. No matter what they say, if they’re a good person, they’ll be doing good things.’ And these people weren’t good. They were hurting me. So, clearly, they weren’t people of God. So that’s, fortunately, how I was able to kind of maintain the separation.”

In the film, Smart is portrayed by 20-yearold British actress Alana Boden. Skeet Ulrich, who plays the demonic Mitchell, said he was tormented by doubts before filming began.

“He was a very complicated guy to figure out, and I had nightmares every night,” said Ulrich, who has starred in projects such as “As Good as It Gets,” “The Newton Boys” and “Jericho.”

Smart, now 30 and the mother of a 2-year-old daughter and a 7-month-old son, said that anyone caught in a horrendous experience like hers should not give up.

“Trust yourself, and find your hope and hold on to it, and don’t let go, ever,” she said.

“And keep holding on, and just do everything you can to survive, because you can be happy again. And you can move forward in your life, and you can … have a normal life. It will be different, but you can have it again.”