New Apple TV+ children’s series inspired by Jane Goodall, on-screen and in real life

NEW YORK – Jane Goodall is not a fan of television. In her limited free time, the renowned British primatologist and environmentalist may occasionally watch a wildlife documentary by her friend David Attenborough or, after a hard day, “something mindless”, as she said in a recent video interview.

But usually, she does not tune in.

So, it may surprise her admirers that she is lending her wisdom and insights to a television series for children – a 10-episode fictional blend of live action and computer-generated imagery titled Jane – which is available on Apple TV+.

“So many people think that’s going to be me,” Goodall, 89, said of the show’s title character. But the high-spirited protagonist is Jane Garcia, a nine-year-old of Filipino and Mexican heritage with an insatiable curiosity.

“I’m her hero,” Goodall said, adding that young Jane, who adorns her walls with articles and photos, has “many bits and pieces from my life in her room”.

Bits and pieces from Goodall’s life also fill the series. Created by J.J. Johnson in collaboration with the Jane Goodall Institute, the global research and conservation non-profit organisation that Goodall founded in 1977, the show stars 11-year-old actress Ava Louise Murchison as Jane who, like Goodall as a child, is inseparable from her stuffed toy chimpanzee.

In Jane, the toy is called Graybeard, an homage to the real David Graybeard, “the chimp who first let me into chimp society”, Goodall said. That tribute is echoed in the name of Jane’s human best friend David (Mason Blomberg), a boy who accompanies her on her adventures.

What young Jane has most in common with Goodall, however, is her interest in nature and commitment to take direct action in wildlife conservation. The series is filmed mostly in Canada, but some episodes were shot on location in Africa and Costa Rica.

Each half-hour episode focuses on an endangered species – the first season includes polar bears, blue whales, giant golden-crowned flying foxes and honeybees – and a research question that Jane is trying to answer: Why do whales sing? Why are worker bees disappearing?

Jane “wants to do something to make the world better”, said Goodall, who lent her imprimatur to the show and had final approval on all its scripts. “That’s the key, and she loves animals. So, in those ways, she resembles me.”

The series began taking shape at an event presented by the Canadian offices of the Goodall Institute, where Johnson suggested that the institute work with his Toronto-based production company, Sinking Ship Entertainment, to devise a children’s series inspired by Goodall’s mission.

In the show they brought to Apple, young Jane does fieldwork, just like her role model. But that exploration takes place entirely in the girl’s imagination.

Viewers accompany the young characters on fantasy expeditions in which the stuffed Graybeard, who is very much a cast member, morphs into a real chimpanzee – although, like almost all of the on-screen wildlife, he is computer-generated.

The series hired Ms Melinda Ozel, an expert on human facial expression, to develop Graybeard’s repertory of more than 300 emotional reactions.

“We really wanted it to feel as real as Jane’s imagination,” Mr Matt Bishop, executive producer in charge of visual effects and animation, said of these scenes. He added: “When kids are playing and they’re taking on different characters and different roles, they’re visualising.”

His team worked with paleontologist Stuart Sumida, who was a consultant on the 2015 action blockbuster Jurassic World, to create the digital creatures. The use of computer-generated imagery ensured not only the young actors’ safety, but also the freedom to shrink them visually to insect size, which happens in the episodes devoted to the honeybee and monarch butterfly.

“We want this to offer unique views of animals that maybe kids haven’t seen in other shows or documentaries,” Johnson said. “So, we need to be able to get into that beehive. We need to be underwater.”

Almost every episode begins with one of these imaginary action-adventure segments, which subsequently result in real-world discoveries.

When Jane’s single mother (Tamara Almeida) meets an attractive man (Dion Johnstone) in their apartment complex, the adults flirt. Their banter leads Jane to infer, correctly, that the strange noises made by gharials, long-snouted crocodilians native to India and Nepal, are part of an effort to find a mate.

Such human plot lines are part of every episode, Johnson said, noting that viewers will care about endangered wildlife only if “we find a way to see ourselves reflected in this animal”.

He cited the episode about the monarch, whose long, multi-generational migration “dovetails so naturally into an immigration story about families”.

As part of that narrative, Jane tries to persuade a neighbour to plant milkweed, monarchs’ only food.

Goodall added that she hoped Jane would inspire young viewers – its target audience is those aged six to nine – to join her institute’s youth service organisation, Roots & Shoots, which sponsors thousands of conservation projects worldwide. The series also highlights other ways children can help the environment, whether by building a bat box (an artificial roost) or donating part of their allowances to conservation.

But perhaps the most important incentives come in each episode’s final minutes, when young Jane conducts a video interview with a real wildlife expert, incorporating genuine animal footage.

These scientists, who include Dr Asha de Vos, a marine biologist in Sri Lanka, and Dr Lisa Paguntalan, executive director of the Philippines Biodiversity Conservation Foundation, are either women or people of colour – and often both.

Together, they are part of the executive producers’ effort to help a diverse array of viewers see conservationists as people like them.

Each interview “tells kids, ‘This might be who I want to be’,” said Ms Andria Teather, an executive producer of the series and a senior adviser at the Jane Goodall Institute Global. “And here’s a role model.” NYTIMES