The iconic voice of celebrated filmmaker and broadcaster Sir David Attenborough has become intrinsically connected to documentary filmmaking — particularly nature documentaries — over the years, but his latest work involves a decidedly different subject matter.
While visiting BBC’s Radio 1, Attenborough was asked to narrate Adele’s wildly popular “Hello” video. The result, well … let’s just say it really does speak for itself. (Pun totally and unabashedly intended.)
As you can see in the video of the exchange provided by Radio 1, Attenborough seems a bit skeptical of the request at first.
“Really?” he asks Radio 1 host Greg James. “Won’t Adele be cross with me?”
After being assured that Adele would probably love the idea, Attenborough commences narrating the video for the hit song — and the rest is something truly brilliant.
“Battling against strong winds and the weight of expectation, she’s convinced that now is her time to strike,” he says in the voice that has made him a living legend in Britain. “She, like all pop stars, needs to hunt to survive. But there’s a problem. The signal is poor and she hasn’t upgraded her handset since 1999.”
“Hashtag … flip phone,” he adds.
Released on October 23, “Hello” is the lead single from Adele’s upcoming third studio album, 25. Upon its release, the song became her second number-one single in the U.K and in the U.S. it became her fourth number-one single and the first song with over a million digital sales in a week.
The video for “Hello” was directed by Xavier Dolan and received more than 27.7 million views on Vevo within 24 hours, breaking the record previously set by Taylor Swift’s “Bad Blood.” It also became the fastest music video to receive 100 million views on Vevo, breaking the record set by Miley Cyrus’ “Wrecking Ball.”
