Last year, recognizing her charisma, Sarai’s parents enrolled her in a program run by Actors, Models and Talent for Christ, or A.M.T.C., a Christian talent and modeling ministry. She traveled to Orlando, Fla., and was picked up by an agent in New York. But it was her father who saw the casting call for the video on an actors database.

The director, Torben Kjelstrup, also entered the picture almost by chance. Mr. Kjelstrup, who lives in Copenhagen, won a contest to make the video for “Soy Yo,” which is off Bomba Estéreo’s 2015 Grammy-nominated album, “Amanecer.”

He didn’t intend to make a political statement. He was inspired by the message of the song — “about being yourself,” he said — and by a photo of his girlfriend from high school. “She had braces, red hair, this incredibly ugly track suit,” he said. “She just had something.”

He pictured “a story about her walking down the street, just emitting this self-confidence that rubs off on the viewer.”

He wanted to “paraphrase a hip-hop video,” so he headed to Brooklyn. (The video is shot in Williamsburg and Bushwick.) He held auditions over the summer that drew more than 100 young actors. “When I saw Sarai,” he said, “when she was waiting, the look on her face was just priceless.”

It was her first role, if you don’t count playing one of “The Three Little Pigs” in a school production.