Obama wins Emmy for narrating national parks documentary

Former President Obama won an Emmy Award on Saturday for his work narrating a national parks documentary series. 

The Television Academy announced that Obama won the “outstanding narrator” Emmy for an episode of the Netflix series “Our Great National Parks.”

Other prominent nominees for the award this year were basketball legend Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, actress Lupita Nyong’o and English broadcaster David Attenborough. 

Obama was nominated for an Emmy in July for his role in the five-part documentary series. 

“Our Great National Parks” promised “wonder, humor, and optimism as each episode tells the story of a national park through the lives of its wildest residents — both big and exceptionally small — and explores our changing relationship with wilderness,” producers said in promoting the series.

Obama and his wife, former first lady Michelle Obama, co-created the series for their production company, Higher Ground Productions, which also fetched seven Emmy nominations in 2020 for its work on the “American Factory” and “Becoming” documentaries.

The former commander in chief has also received multiple Grammy awards for his audiobook reading work on his two published memoirs.

Former President Eisenhower won a special Emmy Award in 1956.