Exclusive: Meet Elvire Emanuelle, Star Of Netflix’s Searing New Drama “First Match”

Courtesy of Netflix

“First Match” Premiered March 30 On Netflix

The lead star of the new Netflix movie, “First Match,” said she hopes her role will shed a light on lesser known stories.

Elvire Emanuelle said she put her all into her character, Monique, or Mo’ and her struggle for acceptance from her distant dad.

“It’s an important story and it needed to be told,” Emanuelle told us. “It’s a story that you don’t hear that much, but it’s a reality for some people.”

Written and directed by Olivia Newman, “First Match” centers around Mo’ – a girl in and out of foster homes – who joins her high school boys’ wrestling team in order to win over her estranged father.

“Mo is shattered and broken, but she has to put on a strong face,” Emanuelle explained. “I wanted it to be authentic and real for people to understand that she’s real.”

Emanuelle said writer director Newman shot the movie on location in Brownsville, Brooklyn, and is loosely based on true events and real people. Newman got the idea for the film after hanging out with a couple of girls who joined the boys wrestling team, and specifically one girl, who was in foster care, who learned at practice that her only living relatives – her grandparents – weren’t interested in taking her in.

The young actress said she hopes viewers take away the fact that “when you fall down, you can get back up again.”

“You’ll see the story of someone you don’t get to see much,” Emmanuel said, “and her trying to get better.”