Luna Sofia Miranda and Mikey Madison attend the premiere of “Anora” during the 2024 Toronto International Film Festival at Royal Alexandra Theatre on September 08, 2024. Photo:

Leon Bennett/Getty

Luna Sofia Miranda wasn’t supposed to be working the day she met Sean Baker at a strip club and her life changed forever.

But that night, Miranda, 26, was called in to work last minute as a dancer at a Brooklyn strip club. She struck up a conversation with what looked like “just another couple” at the bar — and they turned out to be filmmaker Baker and his producer wife, Samantha Quan.

The pair quickly discovered that Miranda was an aspiring actress and invited her to audition for the role of Lulu, the best friend and coworker of Anora, the title character in their indie movie Anora.

Fast-forward to a few years later and now Miranda is walking the red carpet at the 97th annual Academy Awards on March 2. “I just never imagined that this would happen,” Miranda tells PEOPLE ahead of the big night.

Luna Sophia Miranda en route to the Oscars. Amy Brownstein

As the daughter of two film professors in Brooklyn, Miranda grew up with movies frequently playing in the house, inspiring her to pursue a career in Hollywood from an early age.

“I think as soon as I could walk and talk, I was like, I want to do that. I want to be an actress,’ ” she says.

She enrolled in free acting classes as a child, and when it came time for high school, her parents helped her apply to a performing arts school. By the time college application season came around, Miranda had her heart set on Rutgers University’s BFA program. She got in — but it was too expensive. Still, she says, “nothing could stop me,” and she enrolled in a local university.

Still struggling to make ends meet and pay for classes, her theater friends suggested she begin working at a local strip club. Because of that job, Miranda was able to land her dream job with her first feature film.

Luna Sofia Miranda attends the “Anora” New York premiere at Regal Times Square on October 15, 2024 in New York City. Jason Mendez/Getty

In Anora, she used her own experience to inform her character, who was supposed to be 19. Miranda pulled from the time she first became a dancer and was “very innocent” and “happy” to just be there. In addition to playing Lulu, the production hired Miranda as a consultant to make the movie as true to its subject matter as possible.

The young actress did so through quips and jokes included throughout the film, such as when one stripper tells Anora, “I guess you found your whale, honey.” “I taught them about sharks and whales,” Miranda tells PEOPLE, laughing. “A shark is a girl who’s going to steal your client, and a whale is a client that’s like going to make your whole night or month just because they have so much money and they’re willing to spend it all.”

Along the way, Miranda experienced great pain in her personal life. Her mom fell ill, and there were many days Miranda had to juggle going between the club, set and the hospital to see her. While she credits her parents for being the “most supportive,” Miranda admits they had a hard time accepting her job as a dancer. Landing Anora, however, changed everything.

“I remember her being like, ‘Don’t you worry about me. Just go make that movie and have the time of your life and whatever happens to me, I’ll be okay,’ ” Miranda says. “And I really feel like because of Anora, we were able to finally reconcile our differences.”

Luna Sophia Miranda heading to the Oscars. Amy Brownstein

Never miss a story — sign up for PEOPLE’s free daily newsletter to stay up-to-date on the best of what PEOPLE has to offer, from juicy celebrity news to compelling human-interest stories.

Now, Miranda has been along for the whirlwind ride of success that Anora has seen, from traveling to Cannes, France, where the film won the Palme d’Or in 2024, to packing her bags for Canada to attend the Toronto International Film Festival. This Sunday, she’s headed for the Oscars — and she couldn’t be more excited.

“I’ve always been really like, ‘I’m going to be an actress, that’s what I’m going to do,’ ” Miranda says. “But there were definitely moments where my hope kind of dwindled, and Anora has just ignited a spark. And I don’t think that spark can go away anymore.”

She adds, “Just getting all these opportunities to go to Cannes and the Oscars has made me just really confident that I can do this.”

While she’s admittedly most excited to see Chappell Roan perform at Elton John’s iconic afterparty, the gravity of promoting a movie like Anora, which is centered around sex workers and is up for six Oscars including Best Picture, is not lost on her.

“I feel just extremely proud to represent my community because most of the women that I work with are dancing at the club so that they can pay for film school, they’re producing shows, they’re writing music, and I just think that Anora has given a lot of people hope that they can make their dreams come true,” she says. “And I hope to just keep that hope burning alive.”

After her win for best actress at the 2025 BAFTAs, Mikey Madison, who plays Anora, dedicated the end of her speech to sex workers, saying they “deserve respect and human decency.” “I will always be a friend and an ally, and I implore others to do the same,” she said.

That moment was “so special,” Miranda says, and she’s hopeful “that Anora and that Mikey’s amazing performance are going to just represent a lot of really positive change.”

Since the movie came out, Miranda’s dad has seen it four times, and her brother has seen it three (which she assures PEOPLE says a lot for him as someone who “never” sees a movie more than once), and their joy and pride has been palpable, Miranda says. As for her mom, who died before she could see the movie, Miranda says she knows she’s “out there cheering me on. I can feel it.”

While the curtain starts to close on the movie that changed everything for Miranda, there’s one final hurrah left — and she has a plan to celebrate.

In one scene that she shares with Madison, Lulu and Anora are showing each other their nails, and the latter waves her butterfly design — a recurring motif as butterflies are hidden on Anora’s clothing throughout the movie, Miranda says.

So if Anora wins Best Picture, “I’m going to get a very, very tiny tattoo of a butterfly to commemorate the film, but also Anora, the character that made this film so wonderful and special,” Miranda says.

Regardless of the night’s outcome, this is only the start for Miranda. While she still occasionally takes shifts at the Brooklyn strip club between projects, she’s already looking ahead — and is in talks for future projects. For now, though, she’s chock full of gratitude.

“I really do feel like Cinderella and that this is a fairy tale just because of the sheer improbability and it just feels like dumb luck and I’m so grateful,” she says.

See PEOPLE’s full coverage of the 97th annual Academy Awards, hosted by Conan O’Brien and airing on ABC.