"Nature" presents part two of the three-part retrospective of David Attenborough's life and work, airing on consecutive Wednesdays at 8 p.m. (ET) on WNET and other PBS stations (check local listings).
The mini-series focuses on three areas that he believes have been transformed most profoundly during his time: film making, science, and the environment.
With distinctive eloquence and enthusiasm for his subject, David Attenborough is our incomparable guide in a lifelong journey through the natural world. How do you trap a Komodo dragon? Can a lion take down an elephant? Why are animals distributed in the way they are around the world? How do animals communicate with one another? What is climate change? How can the health of the planet be insured?
Attenborough answers these questions and more, recounting with wit and humor all the wonders of the natural world he has been able to share with his viewers – wonders sometimes never before seen on television.
The 86-year old veteran of wildlife filmmaking returns to key locations that played a part in his remarkable body of work, shares old photos, anecdotes and rare footage from the early days in his television career. Informed by a lifetime devoted to understanding and documenting the natural world, Attenborough also shares with viewers his unique personal reflections about nature and the earth.
Tonight Episode two: Attenborough’s Life Stories: Understanding the Natural World
Attenborough shares his memories of the scientists and the breakthroughs that helped shape his own career in translating these discoveries into film. Attenborough is seen interviewing Austrian scientist Konrad Lorenz who studied animal behavior and geese in particular. Lorenz determined that if he was the first thing young goslings saw when they hatched, they would follow him as they would a parent. This process, known as imprinting, was a boon to filmmakers who could film animals behaving naturally in the wild.
Demonstrating some of the thrilling attempts to bring new science to a television audience, Attenborough is seen standing in the shadow of an erupting volcano as lumps of hot lava crashes around him. He’s describing how continental drift, caused by volcanic eruptions on the sea bottom, explains why a closely related group of animals can occur on both sides of an ocean.
Following up on his boyhood fascination with a book illustration showing a bird of paradise being hunted by native tribes, Attenborough ventures to New Guinea in search of the elusive bird and is charged by a group of armed tribesmen until he offers a handshake signaling his peaceful intent. Eventually his cameraman filmed a plumed male and unplumed female, possibly the first film ever taken of a bird of paradise displaying in the wild, but Attenborough returned 40 years later with better cameras and the ability to shoot high up in the trees. Among other topics featured are DNA fingerprinting, chimpanzee behavior and Charles Darwin’s theory of natural selection.
Next Week Episode three: Attenborough’s Life Stories: Our Fragile Planet
Attenborough reflects on the dramatic impact that we have had on the natural world during his lifetime, such as the disappearing rain forests and coral reefs, endangered species such as the blue whale, manatees, sea otters, chimpanzees, and orangutans. He notes how the vulnerable Panamanian golden frog is now quarantined for safety so it doesn’t succumb to a highly infectious fungus which has already made the Monteverde Toad from Costa Rica extinct.
He tells surprising, entertaining and deeply personal stories of the changes he has seen, from his early travels with the London Zoo collecting animals; showing viewers the world’s rarest living animal, the giant Galapagos tortoise, Lonesome George; to covering the work of Dian Fossey, whose life’s mission to study and protect the endangered mountain gorillas in Rwanda inspired him to become a conservationist.
But Attenborough also reviews the revolution in attitudes towards nature that has taken place around the globe. He cites the creation in 1961 of the World Wildlife Fund, the first international organization to spend money on conservation projects around the globe, and protections put into place in Borneo and Malaysia to protect birds and turtles.
He concludes with a warning about the consequences of sea ice melt: exposing the dark sea water that doesn’t reflect the sun’s heat to keep earth cool. Unlike ice and snow, it absorbs the sun’s heat, raising the sea temperature and its level. Climate change, he says, is already affecting the lives of not only wild animals, but ourselves.
Attenborough’s Life Stories is a co-production of THIRTEEN and BBC in association with WNET. Alastair Fothergill is executive producer. David Attenborough is presenter. For Nature, Fred Kaufman is executive producer.
Nature pioneered a television genre that is now widely emulated in the broadcast industry. Throughout its history, Nature has brought the natural world to millions of viewers. The series has been consistently among the most-watched primetime series on public television.
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