Barack Obama, the former president of the United States, received his first Emmy award for narrating the five-part Netflix documentary series Our Great National Parks.
Obama, a Grammy winner, becomes the first President to win a competitive award for a specific television project and the second President to receive an Emmy after Dwight Eisenhower, who received one in 1956 while still in office.
Obama nabbed the Outstanding Narrator award at tonight’s Creative Arts Emmy ceremony, beating Kareem Abdul-Jabbar (Black Patriots: Heroes of the Civil War), David Attenborough (The Mating Game), W. Kamau Bell (We Need to Talk About Cosby), and Lupita Nyong’o (Serengeti II) in a star-studded category.
David Attenborough Meets President Obama earned him a News and Documentary Emmy nomination in 2016.
Obama wasn’t there at the ceremony, so when RuPaul presented the category, the Academy accepted on his behalf.
The former president and first lady Michelle Obama’s production business, Higher Ground, focuses the spotlight on some of the world’s most breathtaking national parks in their film, In Our Great National Parks.
As per Cbsnews, the five-part series is likewise produced by Freeborne Media and Wild Space Productions and takes place in both nearby and distant areas, including the Gunung Leuser National Park in Indonesia, Tsavo, Kenya, and the Monterey Bay National Marine Aquarium in California.
The Emmy joins Mr. Obama’s two Grammy awards putting him halfway to becoming an Egor – someone with an Emmy, Grammy, Oscar, and Tony award.
He becomes only the second US president in history to win an Emmy.
The series, which debuted in April, is a part of the Obamas’ multi-year film and television deal that the President and his wife struck with Netflix in 2018.
Only 17 people have gained Egot status to date, including Mel Brooks, Whoopie Goldberg, Audrey Hepburn, and Jenifer Hudson.
