PBS documentary exploring Islam’s greatest love stories airs in Charlotte region
While attending Harvard Divinity School, Ariella Gayotto Hohl knew her mission would be to contribute to her community and she thought often about how and what those things would be.
But the how and what didn’t happen until she learned her father suddenly died from cancer.
“Everything became so personal,” said Gayotto Hohl, who practices Islam. “I had to kind of find a way to understand what to do with life afterwards. My dad was the greatest love of my life.”
From that personal pain, Gayotto Hohl saw a way to understand her grief and used the knowledge she learned in her graduate studies on the power of storytelling. She later connected with Alex Kronemer, a film producer who was working on a project about love and loss in the Islamic tradition.
A two-hour documentary, “Islam’s Greatest Love Stories,” will follow Gayotto Hohl’s journey through love and grief. The film, which premiers Aug. 22, explores five love stories important to the Islamic religion including the Taj Mahal’s hidden messages, the Prophet Muhammad and his wife Khadija, and the familial love between Malcom X and his sister, Ella Little-Collins.
The film presentation comes at a time when the Muslim population is growing in Mecklenburg County and around North Carolina. The decennial census does not collect data on religious affiliations, according to the government agency. However, the number of residents who identify as Muslim has increased: it grew from 0.3% of Mecklenburg County’s population in 2010 to 2.9% in 2020, according to The Association of Religion Data Archives.
There are around 50,000 Muslims in the Charlotte metropolitan area, according to the Levine Museum of the New South. Last year in March, Gov. Josh Stein’s office announced that there are over 130,000 Muslims living in North Carolina.
Omid Safi, a professor of Islamic studies at Duke University, is featured in the film speaking briefly on each story.
“Love and grief are universal experiences and love is so central to the human experience as a whole. And Islam is no exception,” said Gayotto Hohl, who is the co-producer and host.
Importance in North Carolina
Above all the stories, Safi will place a special focus on the ones about the poet Rumi and the tale of Layla and Majnun, a classic love story written similar to “Romeo and Juliet.” Written in 1188, Layla and Majnun predates the Shakesparian tragedy by more than 400 years.
Speaking with Safi, Gayotto Hohl comes to the conclusion that love is more than an emotion. It’s a force.
Safi joined the film because love is at the core of Islamic spirituality.
“There’s no way of telling the history of Muslims in the U.S. without centering Black Muslims,” said Gayotto Hohl, a Brazil native who lives in Boston. “Because it’s the central part of the story and it has shaped all of the other Muslim communities as well.”
Safi agrees, “We’ve been here for centuries. The life of Muslims in North Carolina predates the establishment of the United States.”
It is estimated that around 10% of the enslaved Africans were Muslim, according to The Autobiography of Omar ibn Said, an enslaved Muslim scholar who lived during the 18th and 19th centuries.
“So our life, our contribution, our very existence here, is part of the fabric of this country,” Safi said.
North Carolina has been a center for scholars such as Omar ibn Said, Gayotto Hohl said.
Said was a Muslim man who was born around 1770 in modern Senegal. He was captured at age 37 and brought to South Carolina to be sold, he later escaped to Fayetteville, North Carolina, his autobiography said.
There is a mosque named after him in Fayetteville.
Part of the enslavement process was the erasure of language, culture, family and religion. Said is a rare example of when the erasure was not completely successful, Safid said.
“We have to imagine thousands and thousands of individuals like him having been brought over to the Americas.”
Many muslims also migrated to the U.S. and North Carolina after 1965, Safid said.
One of the most important parts of the film is the story of Ella Little-Collins unconditional love towards Malcolm X, Gayotto Hohl said. Not only was he a civil rights activist but he also influenced people to also convert to Islam.
Public Media
Unity Productions Foundation, founded by Kronemer, worked with PBS to make “Islam’s Greatest Love Stories” months before news erupted of federal public broadcasting funding falling into jeopardy.
In July, the U.S. Senate approved the Trump administration’s plan to remove $9 billion in federal funding previously allocated for foreign aid and public broadcasting. The 51-48 Senate vote means that the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, which administers the funds for NPR radio stations and PBS TV affiliates, is on track to lose $1.1 billion that had been budgeted for the next two years, the Los Angeles Times reported.
Gayotto Hohl believes PBS is central to public education in America.
She said Unity Productions chose to work with them because of its ability to “educate and reach millions of people in the U.S. and sometimes even beyond with this type of content. It’s very intentional content. It’s a content that is rooted in healing and peacemaking in learning.”
Public television, radio and independent media allow for a robust and thriving democracy by educating, Safid said.
During her travels, the way Gayotto Hohl thought about love changed, she said. She realized love gives people the power to do things they otherwise wouldn’t be able to do and that love is a value and a choice.
“There are dark times that we’re living through,” Gayotto Hohl said. “Love is a force that I believe need to keep us going.”
How to watch
“Islam’s Greatest Love Stories” premieres at 9 p.m., Aug. 22 on PBS North Carolina.
It will also stream for one month on the PBS website and app along with Youtube for free.
This story was originally published August 6, 2025 at 6:00 AM with the headline "PBS documentary exploring Islam’s greatest love stories airs in Charlotte region."
