Former President Barack Obama is the surprise narrator for the upcoming Netflix documentary Our Great National Parks, a five-part series exploring wildlife around the world. The series was announced last February as part of programming that Barack and Michelle Obama are producing for Netflix through their company Higher Ground Productions, although the announcement did not mention that the former president would serve as host and narrator.
“A fish that can walk. Surfing hippos who want to catch the waves. Species not found anywhere else on earth,” Obama says in the Our Great National Parks trailer. “When humanity began to protect these wild places, we had no idea how important they would become: this is a refuge for endangered species and a hotbed of scientific research.”
Deadline reports that the show includes footage from parks in Monterey Bay, California, Tsavo National Park in Kenya, and Gunung Leuser National Park in the Indonesian rainforest.
The Obamas signed a multi-year deal with Netflix in 2018 with the stated goal of creating “a diverse mix of content, including the potential for scripted series, unscripted series, docu-series, documentaries and feature films” from Higher Ground Productions. In addition to the national park series, the company brought the children’s shows Ada Twist, The Scientist, and Waffles + Mochi to Netflix; the Oscar-winning documentary “American Factory”; Peabody Award-winning film Crip Camp: A Disability Revolution and Becoming based on Michelle Obama’s memoir.
Our Great National Parks debuts on Netflix on April 13th.