Copenhagen Cowboy’s Angela Bundalovic on what really matters: “Our time is short here in life”

Thoughtful. Stoic. A little bit of an enigma. We know little of where she’s come from, or indeed where she’s planning on heading. No, we’re not referring to the illusive and word-shy tracksuit-wearing Miu, the wide-eyed protagonist of Netflix’s new six-episode series, Copenhagen Cowboy, rather the 28-year-old Danish actress, Angela Bundalovic, who plays her. For one, when I get down to researching her ahead of our Zoom interview, there’s barely any digital trace of her. No Instagram or Twitter to frantically scroll through for a little morsel of insight, and certainly no TikTok. “It's just not me,” she explains. Do I detect a shudder?

“I had it once, I just didn't really use it. I have much better things to do,” says Bundalovic. Well, quite. And we have to forgive her after all, because those better things have consisted of working with director Nicolas Winding Refn, of Pusher and Drive fame, on the neon-drenched show that has much of Scandinavia chomping at the bit with anticipation. Though they often say don’t ever meet your idols, for Bundalovic and Winding Refn it certainly worked out. “I grew up watching his films,” she explains. “I was born when Pusher One came out – I watched it afterwards in my teenage years, and Drive was also something everyone watched and listened to the soundtrack. When I was in high school, I fell in love with the modern fairy tale that it is,” she recalls.

When it came to taking on Miu, who the actress describes as “a sort of alien character,” the path to portrayal was slightly muddier than other roles she’d previously played. Beatrice in the post-apocalyptic series Rain involved, for example, “a lot of being a cast, like a character gallery, and how that character gallery works together”, says Bundalovic, whereas in comparison Miu is something of an unknown. “She was not coming from a specific class in society or specific job or specific country, so I couldn't do any research on that,” explains the actress.

What Miu is though, is physical – Winding Refn saw her as “a very bodily character”, which greatly appealed to Bundalovic, who boasts a background in choreography. Drawing on meditation practices too, something which Bundalovic has done in her everyday life for the last six years, also helped her to prep and bring a sense of hyper-focus. “You can stay with one thing for a really long time, which I had to do with Miu,” she says.

Having studied at Teaterbutikken in Copenhagen’s meatpacking district, where casting directors would on occasion come and cast for roles, Bundalovic has been priming herself for a title role for some time. But that creative inspiration first blossomed much closer to home, in the thick of her family, with her mum, dad and sister, where sometimes school was skipped and replaced with a sneaky trip to the local library or theatre.

“Our home was a bit of a bubble of just dressing up a lot. Me and my sister had our own circus – I was the one who couldn't pick which role I wanted,” she recalls. “Me and my sister have always been encouraged to learn, listen to music, read books and watch films."

And she still draws on the wisdom of her parents, particularly when it comes to the realities of life as a jobbing actor, who sometimes find themselves with great swathes of time between project blocks. “I love to work, so I'm still learning that when I'm not working that it's OK… I just have to accept that I'm not on a project and enjoy it and feel settled and calm within that,” says Bundalovic. “My mum is really good at telling me that it's important, this time when you are not on a project.”

Certainly, it’s no real secret that the film industry can be a tough arena to find yourself in, particularly as a young woman. When you’re not dealing with the disruptive schedules, you’re having to face the rejections of casting directors. Does she ever get a little dispirited by it all? “I'm quite young, so I really admire people who go on for 30, 40 years and maintain their integrity and their spirit, because yes, sure, there are a lot of hard no's,” says Bundalovic. Dealing with it, she says, requires “a horse will and discipline – and I have that as well from my parents. I think also from my Serbian background, I have the strong will and discipline to just continue.”

Carving out a safe haven in her apartment (her “nest”) in home city of Copenhagen has helped, as has finding joy in life’s simple pleasures, like reading, dancing and playing the accordion. All of which, surely, would be far less achievable if she had the distracting ghost of social media hanging over her. After all, as Bundalovic says: “Our time is short here in life and we just have to prioritise what you want to spend time on.” Note to self.