Nathalie Emmanuel’s first performance ever was playing Young Nala in the West End production of The Lion King in 1999, when she was just 10 years old, according to The New York Times. Seven years later, she was cast as a teenage drug addict and prostitute in the soap opera, Hollyoaks. After this, Emmanuel wound up working at a Hollister clothing store when she heard about a casting call for a “nonwhite female” in Game of Thrones, per the Times. She was already a fan of the HBO show and told her agent that the part was meant for her.
But Emmanuel said trying out for roles was challenging. As she recalled to the Times, some people were “slightly snobby about the fact that I had only done soap and hadn’t really done a traditional training…” But Emmanuel did land the high-profile part and joined the HBO series for Season 3, playing Missandei, a slave who becomes a free woman and trusted advisor to Daenerys Targaryen (Emilia Clarke).
For a show that killed off almost every major character, Missandei totally defied the odds and made it to the eighth and final season. When her character was killed, at the hands of Cersei Lannister (Lena Headey), it sparked so much outrage that Emmanuel responded to angry fans all over the world.
