‘I’m still holding on to the Telugu culture I remember’

By training, she treats hearts. For passion, she follows her own. A practicing cardiologist in the US, Dr. Praveena Paruchuri leads a life far removed from the Telugu villages her films are set in. But her heart, it seems, has always stayed there.

Best known for producing and acting in the critically acclaimed C/o Kancharapalem and Uma Maheshwara Ugra Roopasya, Praveena’s latest indie film, Kothapallilo Okkapudu, released quietly in theatres this month, marking her directorial debut. “My original plan was to be a director. I became a producer to make that happen,” she reveals.

Raised in America, Praveena spent her childhood summers in Andhra villages with her grandparents—memories of simple lives and deeper stories now shape her work. “Through my films, I’m offering my memory of Telugu culture as a child,” she says. “That’s what I still hold on to.” Though from a non-artistic background, she was always drawn to dance and storytelling. Her father’s love for Telugu cinema introduced her to its soul, while her passion for classical dance deepened her connection to mythology and emotion. “Cinema felt like a natural extension of all that.” “Medicine was the practical path, but when my father had a mild heart attack, I realised that if something happened to him before I made a film, it would all feel meaningless,” she recalls.

With no connections in Hyderabad, she reached out to a YouTube consultant, who introduced her to C/o Kancharapalem director Venkatesh Maha. She joined as a producer and even acted as a sex worker in the film when no one else was willing to play the role. “I wasn’t pursuing acting seriously back then. Now, it’s what I enjoy the most.”

“Growing up between two cultures, I often felt ‘too Indian’ for the US and ‘not Indian enough’ for India,” she says. “Maybe that in-betweenness helps me see cinema as an outsider. ” The bigger challenge, she says, is finding space for the kind of stories she wants to tell. “Audiences now want spectacles, Pan Indian action. I love Tom Cruise,” she laughs. “But even in America, people are tired of superhero films. There has to be space for small stories.”

She finds comfort in what the film did achieve. “The fact that Kothapallilo Okkapudu made it to theatres at all means something,” she says. “Maybe the film will find its audience on OTT, like Kancharapalem did.”