Barack Obama Wins Outstanding Narrator at the 2025 Creative Arts Emmys

Barack Obama is now a three-time Emmy winner!

The former president, 64, won in the Outstanding Narrator category at the 76th Creative Arts Emmy Awards on Sunday, Sept. 7. He earned the trophy for his work in Netflix’s Our Oceans.

While Obama wasn’t present in Los Angeles to accept his latest accolade over the weekend, presenter Jordan Klepper accepted it on his behalf.

The category’s other nominees included Sir David Attenborough for Planet Earth: Asia, Idris Elba for Erased: WW2’s Heroes Of Color, Tom Hanks for The Americas and Phoebe Waller-Bridge for Octopus!.

Obama, who was announced as the narrator for the Netflix docuseries back in September 2024, made his debut on the series just two months later.

The project, which allowed viewers to experience the “gateways to the unknown,” offered the former president’s narration across five episodes dedicated to each of the world’s oceans. Obama broke down the Pacific Ocean’s humpback whales and their migration process and explained how walruses in the Arctic Ocean were coping with climate change, while also making sure to hit the Indian, Southern and Atlantic Oceans in the process.

The “Indian Ocean” portion of the series in particular put him in Emmy contention this time around. The series was created by the filmmakers behind Our Great National Parks and was filmed with newly developed underwater filming technology.

Obama previously took home two Primetime Emmys in 2022 and 2023 for his work on Our Great National Parks and Working: What We Do All Day, respectively.

As for Attenborough, the 99-year-old biologist and host is already a three-time Emmy winner and has been nomination for the trophy on 12 occasions since 1985.

Attenborough’s latest effort with Emmy buzz dropped back in January, offering “thrilling wildlife stories from each corner of the continent,” per a synopsis for Planet Earth: Asia — with the third episode, titled “The Frozen North,” scoring him the Emmy nod.

“Filmed over the course of nearly four years, this is the first time that Asia has been the focus of a major BBC wildlife series,” BBC Earth’s website notes of the series. “From the vast Gobi Desert to the jungles of Borneo, and from the polar wilderness of Siberia to the coral seas of the Indian Ocean, this series will showcase the breath-taking variety of Asia’s wildest places.”

Speaking with National Geographic in June, the conservationist revealed that he continues to work into his 90s “because people I like working with keep asking me to.”

Elba found himself in Emmy contention for National Geographic’s Erased: WW2’s Heroes of Color this year, specifically for its episode on “D-Day.”

The actor, who is a seven-time Emmy nominee, was first nominated at the Primetime Emmys for his work in Luther and The Big C in 2011. In the years since, he’s also scored a nod for Hijack.

He served as executive producer of the Erased, with the project’s “D-Day” episode offering a look at “the stories of three men of the 320th Barrage Balloon Battalion, who landed in Normandy on D-Day and helped to liberate Europe,” per a synopsis. The series itself “reveals the heroic stories of people of color whitewashed from the greatest conflict in history.”

Speaking with PEOPLE last year about the emotional and educational World War II docuseries, Elba said the series helped him recognize “how traumatic it must have been” for Black soldiers who defended their country and returned home a society that was heavily segregated.

“Of course, there were Black soldiers, white soldiers, but you were all one and you moved as one organism and within that setting, you were called a soldier,” Elba said at the time.

He added, “The moment you stepped back into the country that you were fighting for, you weren’t called a soldier anymore. You were called something much worse, and [it was] accepted.”

Hanks, and 18-time Emmy nominee and 7-time winner himself, helped highlight both North and South America with The Americas and gave viewers a look at “the wonders, secrets, and fragilities of the world’s only supercontinent,” he previously told PEOPLE.

The docuseries featured episodes on Mexico, Patagonia and more — with Hanks’ Emmy recognition arriving for his work narrating an episode on the “Andes,” the earth’s longest mountain range. It was filmed over five years and 180 expeditions and premiered on NBC in February.

Hanks caught up with PEOPLE about the 10-part The Americas in November, calling it an “hour of discovery” that leaves viewers “enthralled, enlightened, educated and — foremost — entertained.”

The actor’s previous Emmy victories have dated back to 1998 and have been for his work HBO’s Band of Brothers, John Adams, The Pacific, Game Changer and Olive Kitteridge — with his most recent previous win for Olive Kitteridge being in 2015.

As for Waller-Bridge, her nomination for the first part of Octopus! marks her first nod since Killing Eve in 2020.

She’s an eight-time Emmy nominee, winning three times for Fleabag in 2019.

Octopus! explores the mysteries of the octopus and those who find obsession in the species, including Tracy Morgan. It premiered on May 8 on Amazon Prime.

Series executive producer and director, Niharika Desai, told PEOPLE ahead of its release that the project was crafted to be “fascinating for octofans and the octo-uninitiated alike.”

The 2025 Creative Arts Emmys are being presented in Los Angeles on Saturday, Sept. 6 and Sunday, Sept. 7. The full show will be broadcast on Saturday, Sept. 13 at 8 p.m. ET on FXX.