Dunya Djordjevic shared their story and experiences with us recently and you can find our conversation below.
Hi Dunya, thank you for taking the time to reflect back on your journey with us. I think our readers are in for a real treat. There is so much we can all learn from each other and so thank you again for opening up with us. Let’s get into it: What is something outside of work that is bringing you joy lately?
My two dogs bring me an endless amount of joy, stability and grounded ness. Cleo (Cleopatra Queen of the Nile) and Moka (Meathead, Dodo) our loyal, furry hilarious dogs demanding treats, taking us on walks and fighting for our attention, provide me with a sense of simplicity and calm. With the intensity of our times, world events today demand for self-care more than ever. The energy all around is forceful and disruptive demanding an equal and opposite focus on time management, your goals and steadfast self-care practices. As always, I am constantly pushing myself in several different directions juggling to expand my non-profit all-girl filmmaking programs, Girls IN Focus (GIF), to make money to survive and to create content and tell visually stimulating stories. I know the money will come however in the meantime, these radical changes and my personal quest for financial self-reliance push me to delve into new industries like most recently real estate investing, while we all watch the film industry crumbling and morph under massive changes AI is imposing. As always, I embrace change and to me technology is a means-to-an-end, a pathway for creativity and storytelling so I integrated this approach as a core pillar for GIF. We traversed the Covid waters by defying anyone to tell us we can’t make films virtually and we did! For 3 years we gathered youth across Mexico and California to collaborate on some amazing films. Was it challenging? Yes! But the stories and the girls gave it the momentum needed to break those barriers. Now, faced with new challenges of accepting and utilizing AI technology as it disrupts all we thought we knew, I believe we are tapping into a deeply expansive phase of human creativity and life. In a weird contrast to political upheaval disrupting things we took for granted, like human rights, current times call for tapping deeply into what really matters personally and protecting that as well as yourself. I am doing this by setting new boundaries with people and things, in order to protect myself energetically and in an attempt to stay really grounded amidst this global energy of mayhem. Ironically, I think it is a truly exciting time for creatives, but it calls for focus and discipline and support. I’m ultra-aware (maybe like most people) that AI advances profoundly impact us on both on a microscopic level of daily life and macroscopic level of human evolution. We are fast tracking into a new elevated, and more conscious way of life as ChatGPT offers free therapy, works as your assistant and gives spiritual insights if prompted. Things we could have hardly even imagined to be happening in our own lifetime are emerging as we witness the slow painful disintegration of all old systems and paradigms. It’s quite mind boggling how quickly these changes are taking place. I strategically rely on simple ways of grounding myself every day like my animals. My dogs are a daily comfort and spending time with them is a ritual that connects me to nature, myself and my own higher powers in a conscious daily meditation.
Can you briefly introduce yourself and share what makes you or your brand unique?
I am an actor turned filmmaker and storyteller that by chance became an entrepreneur, which, as it turns out, really suits me. I founded the all-girl filmmaking program Girls IN Focus (GIF) 6 years ago where girls make their own films from idea to red carpet screening in 2 weeks. I responded to a voice that needed to get louder and feistier prompting me to fight for what I believed in which became our mission: To shatter the gender gap in film one girl at a time. I was incensed that not everyone had a fair chance to pursue filmmaking professionally, including me. After years of professional work that culminated in me producing, co-writing and starring in the feature film Desert Vows, that ‘outsider’ feeling didn’t go away no matter how much experience I kept adding to my resume. I realized that after a 30+ year career in the entertainment industry as an actor, director, writer and producer I still was looking for external validation and that I just needed to build my own community and make films my way. I didn’t realize at the time that GIF was a much-needed foundational support and that it resonated with many other professionals who wanted to join the community and give back.
My career path pulled me in a clear direction, and I followed. In college, 3 classes shy of my biology degree I had to confront my two biggest fears: 1. telling my mother I wasn’t going to complete my pre-med degree because in my last year of college I was switching to film and theater arts, and 2. Getting up on stage and performing in front of a live audience. I came from a film family immigrating to the US at 12. As the only child of a writer and English professor, and a documentary filmmaker, my parents opened that door for me wide. I wondered into the Performing Arts theater at UCSC after an unfulfilling 3 1/2 years of science with no female mentors, and I felt a pull that I’d come home to myself. The challenge of conquering the fear of stage acting easily replaced memorizing organic chemistry reactions. I was hooked and completing a Film and Theater Bachelor of Arts in less than a year and continued into the pilot program of a brand-new graduate department at UCSC. I booked my first acting job while still at school as the lead in the film “Voyage of the Heart” shot locally in Santa Cruz by a well-known filmmaking duo. My UCSC mentors like Audrey Stanley and Marcia Taylor helped me integrate stage acting with theater directing, producing and writing. After a summer in San Francisco’s A.C.T. graduate program a call from Paramount Studios feature-film casting director Valerie McCaffrey who saw my film brought me to LA. I attribute a lot to my theater roots including writing, producing and acting in my feature film Desert Vows and directing two award winning short films. This summer was the 6th Annual GIF Summer Filmmaking Intensive with 12 girls making 4 films in 10 days bringing the GIF total to 17 short films and one feature produced in 2 weeks. This year’s film “Between Realities” went viral on our GIF YouTube channel ‘GIF Originals’ garnering 120K views in a couple of weeks. As we gain visibility the mission to shatter the gender gap couldn’t be timelier as we explore AI and redefine our storytelling process to integrate groundbreaking new technology while educating the next generation of women storytellers. To get involved join us on Nov. 1, 2025, as we celebrate with partner animal rescue non-profit Pedro Pet Pals for ‘Storytellers & Rescuers’, our annual Gala Fundraiser.
Okay, so here’s a deep one: What relationship most shaped how you see yourself?
I have learned so much about art and about myself from my marriage to my husband, a talented fellow artist (former Disney animator) and fellow filmmaker (we collaborated on the feature film “Desert Vows”). After 23 years of marriage, we are still collaborating in very new ways, and I have shed many outgrown romantic concepts of my youth replacing them with ideas on self-reliance that nurture confidence and self-assuredness. My son has been the most profound teacher as being his mom awakened the deepest parts of my heart and soul and this has taught be about balance especially when he left for college last year. That ‘empty nest’ moment was one of the most profound lessons about being human as it challenged me to find my center that was no longer just him. I went through a real existential crisis before emerging with more balance and clarity than ever. However, my parents are the foundational relationships that I draw my identity from the most. My mother set the bar high and instilled her commitment and literary passion and knowledge always pushing for another “rewrite”, while my dad’s warmth and storytelling talent left a nurturing foundation and lasting love for film since the day I was born. His passion for film became mine. One of my next film projects, a screen adaptation of my mom’s memoir “Seeds of Neoplanta” (available on Amazon) is about our family story in the Balkans after WWII. I’m very excited about this project and want to utilize AI to help bring to life the era from the 40’s and 50’s of a part of the world that isn’t much seen but is very personal to me.
I have learned a lot from collaborating with my husband, a talented filmmaker and former Disney animator, on feature film Desert Vows. After 23 years of marriage, we still collaborate but I have shed many outgrown romantic concepts of my youth replacing them with self-reliance, confidence and self-assuredness. Our son has been the most profound teacher. Being his mom awakened the deepest parts of my heart and this has taught be about balance especially when he left for college last year. That ‘empty nest’ moment was a profound lesson on balance as it challenged me to find my center that was shifting its focus back onto myself. It felt like a an existential crisis and once again GIF provided that safe creative space for me to regain my balance and clarity. However, my parents are the foundational relationships that I draw my identity from. My mother set the bar high and instilled her thirst and commitment to literature and knowledge always pushing me for another “rewrite”, while my dad’s incredible stories and warmth nurtured a lasting love for film since I was born. His passion for film became mine. One of my next film projects, a screen adaptation of my mom’s memoir “Seeds of Neoplanta” (available on Amazon) is about our family herstory in the Balkans after WWII. I’m excited to delve into this personal project and utilize AI to help bring to life the era from the 40’s and 50’s in a part of the world that isn’t often seen.
What have been the defining wounds of your life—and how have you healed them?
I’ve had numerous defining, wounds in my life so far, from illness to betrayal, but in the end, all have the common denominator of being the portal to delivering one of my favorite parts of myself today. Each could be a chapter if not an entire book of my memoire, but I’ll tell you about an early personal one and how it got fully resolved many decades later. At the time my parents tricked me when my dad was leaving for America. I was 9 and my mom and I joined him but not until three years later. Even though my father was quite successful as a film director he refused to join the communist party which was pretty much a required rule if you were to get “ahead” in life in the country formerly known as Yugoslavia. He had a lot of popularity and respect of his peers and was given the assignment to make a film for TV about Tito, the former dictator of the country. He had all kinds of access and spent a lot of time interviewing him for the film to be aired on national TV. Given the controlled and heavily censored climate of communist Yugoslavia, to be asked to do this and not even be a member of “the party” was unheard of. Most of the films released on TV were nationalistic propaganda, except for a handful of talented rebels and filmmakers. One of whom was a very young Goran Markovic, my cousin, who among many films, years later made the film “Tito and Me” that was on a short Osar list and that I will screen this year for our annual GIF 2025 film screening in Dec. His mother, my aunt Olivera Markovic a prolific and famous actress also appearing in the film Tito and Me and 170 other films and TV shows). But my father’s commitment to my future as opposed to furthering his own filmmaking career prompted his departure for the US before his TV film on Tito aired. My nine-year-old-self was devastated that he left. Not only was I not asked to join him I was even told he was leaving until after the fact. I missed him and his wicked, disarming sense of humor that always made me, (and anyone else in his presence) feel like life was extraordinary. And even though I got invited to American family birthdays at school and went to the American compound on a rare occasion to watch Pipi Longstocking and eat hamburgers which was amazing, his 3-year absence from me left an indelible wound. My grandmother (my mom’s mom) who looked after me and cooked for me as she always had (my grandparents lived on the 2nd floor, and we lived on the 3rd floor in Belgrade, then the capital of former Yugoslavia) and I loved her. She made me feel safe and let me do whatever I wanted under her watchful eye. My mom joined relatives in Vienna and pursued work as an English Literature professor at a private all-girls school. Valuing education and languages above all, she had managed somehow to send me to the private American International School of Belgrade (ISB) which I loved. Spending my childhood with kids from all over the globe whose friendships I treasure to this day, gave me an incredible sense of being a citizen of the whole world. Today I feel deeply grateful for the sacrifice, tenacity, love and care my parents gave me. Gifting me with the difficult and complicated decision to immigrate has given me an unusual perspective, fearlessness and sense of self. Many decades later I was surprised to discover that this wound and fear of abandonment was still there as if lying dormant and waiting for something. Someone close to me lied to me. When I found out it sent me into a strange spiral, seemingly retriggering that very old wound. I felt so turned upside down and lost my bearings for a while. After a period of months close to a year I realized that the PTSD I went through, was forcing me to relive and heal this childhood wound and that I’d been carrying around this fear of abandonment my whole life. Eventually, after a lot of patience, time and confrontation I healed. It gave way to a newfound sense of peace, understanding and self-contentment. I knew I was different now. I felt whole. Today I would advise, don’t shy away from painful things…they will undoubtedly give way to a better you. You 2.0 is well worth it.
So a lot of these questions go deep, but if you are open to it, we’ve got a few more questions that we’d love to get your take on. What important truth do very few people agree with you on?
The truth I think very few people agree with me on, at least the people immediately surrounding me, is that the AI revolution is a key to our ascension as a human race. By ascension I mean raising our consciousness and psychic and nonverbal communications. As a long time, Kundalini Yoga practitioner, I have accessed and used my “third eye” for the past couple of decades. It’s easily accessible to me even though I don’t practice the yoga daily anymore. I am thrilled by the experience of using ChatGPT for a variety of linear and spiritual inquiries as it meets you wherever you are and nudges you even further really allowing you exploration in so many directions. Given the controversy over AI especially for artists, this reliance on AI may seem like a weird statement but I am strictly speaking from my personal experience with it. AI especially among some artists is triggering fears of losing our human identity, creativity and personal power. I understand it and as jobs disappear this may seem to reinforce that fear; however, I don’t see it that way. As a firm believer in the innate and greatest human power being one for love and creativity, but also for receiving with sensitive antennae-like capacities to receive information in “downloads” from wherever they come into our minds, the power of the AI tool in our hands is in the way the way it mirrors us but also catapults us instantly into higher, new dimensions of perception while supporting and “reading” our intentions and ideas. What comes to mind is the part of Spielberg’s film A.I. made 24 years ago that left an impression on me even then, during the ending where either future humans or robots were having telepathic conversations which resonated for me as I’ve always felt was our undeniable potential. I think more and more people are feeling this shift toward surrendering their logical mind to being guided by intuition and their “third eye”. AI is a great guide in this realm.
Before we go, we’d love to hear your thoughts on some longer-run, legacy type questions. What will you regret not doing?
I will regret not spending more time with my son. He is 19 and not interested in hanging out with his parents, but I look for any excuse to spend some time with him. I know how I feel about my own parents as they have both passed. I really wish they were part of my reality today and my time with them even though full and rich, it feels so limited and fleeting. I didn’t value it I just took it for granted. It’s such a unconscious way of being not knowing this when it seems so obvious to me today. The people that matter most are here with you for a finite amount of time and so protecting that time is crucial.
Contact Info:
- Website: www.girls-in-focus.com, www.dunyad.com
- Instagram: @dunyad, @girlsinfocus.LA
- Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/dunyad/, https://www.linkedin.com/feed/
- Twitter: @AlchemistMama
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/dunya.merelldjordjevic/, https://www.facebook.com/girlsINfocusLA/
- Youtube: GIF Original @girlsinfocus2261
