Vidhi Salla, a radio host, author and journalist whose focus is on Indian cultural arts, is pioneering the introduction of Bollywood to New England theaters.

Salla grew up in Mumbai and studied literature before moving to southern Vermont in 2018 to live with her husband, Joel. The two met in a coastal city in southeast India called Pondicherry, where Joel was a performing musician at a festival Salla was hired to organize. They shared a love for culture, music and media and very quickly started a long-distance relationship across the globe.

Before meeting Joel, Salla had never even heard of Vermont. But she says that just as quickly as she fell in love with him, she fell in love with the area.

Salla is most well-known for her radio show, “Vidhi’s Bollywood Jukebox” on WVEW in Brattleboro, where she introduces audiences to different aspects of Indian music and films with both an educational and entertaining flare.

“The radio show was sort of my entry into not only just the New England community but also sharing the knowledge I had gathered as a passive listener, audience member and journalist,” Salla said. She also said that when she lived in India there was no such thing as community public radio.

Salla’s successful weekly Bollywood series at the Latchis Theatre in Brattleboro was the catalyst for her expansion into Greenfield, where, on every second Monday of the month until January, she will host Bollywood movie nights with English subtitles at Garden Cinemas with the hope of creating new fans for the genre and spreading the joy and wonder that the unique productions can bring.

“I want people to experience Bollywood. The films are meant to be a spectacle. They’re meant to draw audiences in and they’re meant to be escapist,” she said.

Bollywood as a genre is unique in the way that it’s filmed. The term itself was coined in the 1970s after blending the names of Bombay and Hollywood, which at the time were the two largest cities for film production in the world.

Song and dance is pivotal for a Bollywood film, with actors and actresses often lip-syncing music recorded in a studio, which allows for more dramatic and emotional scenes.

The next showings at Garden Cinemas will take place on Nov. 11, Dec. 9 and Jan. 13, with Salla doing Q&A sessions preceding the films.

“I like to come from a place where I tell the audience why the film was made, where the characters are coming from, and what was happening in India during the sociocultural context the film was made in,” she said.

Salla said that her favorite film, “Sholay,” (screening on Nov. 11 at 6:30 p.m.) which she says is notably the most watched Bollywood film of all time. The film was so popular after its release in 1975 that vinyls of the audio were created and played throughout cafes and shops in India for years. The film itself continued to run in theaters for five years after the premiere.

Interestingly, “Sholay” was one of the first films to introduce surround sound in India. Salla says that when her father went to go see the film in theaters, during one scene where a coin flipped, the sound was so captivating and convincing and new that everyone in the theater turned their heads to see where the coin had landed.

Salla also recognizes that Bollywood may feel intimidating to newcomers, especially when there are so many films to choose from.

“New England as an area doesn’t have that big of an audience. They may be aware of [Bollywood], but also they don’t know what films to watch and that’s where I come in,” she said.

Garden Cinemas Owner Isaac Mass is enthusiastic about the untapped market potential of Bollywood in his city. Mass said that it’s important for the Southeast Asian population in Greenfield to see themselves on screen, and for other members of the community to expand their consumption of different kinds of film.

“We hope that Vidhi can initiate a curious audience into becoming enthusiastic fans of some of the world’s best cinema. Sometimes cinephiles need assistance from experts and critics to know where to invest their time for a great new experience,” he said.

The next three films screening in the series are: “Sholay” on Nov. 11, “Queen” on Dec. 9 and “Shree 420” on Jan. 13.

To learn more about Salla and her shows, you can visit her website: vidhiism.com.

For more information on the Bollywood film series and to purchase tickets, visit the Garden Cinemas website at gardencinemas.net.