Arnold Schwarzenegger’s first scripted TV series, the Jennifer Lopez-starring action film The Mother and documentaries featuring Anna Nicole Smith and Barack Obama are among the high-profile projects hitting Netflix this month.
At the end of May, the streamer is dropping the Schwarzenegger-starring spy comedy FUBAR, in which the former California governor and Top Gun: Maverick’s Monica Barbaro play a father and daughter who discover they’ve each been secretly working as CIA operatives as they’re forced to team up and get to know each other’s true selves.
And earlier this month, in time for Mother’s Day, Lopez plays an assassin who emerges from hiding to protect a daughter she gave up for adoption years earlier in The Mother, streaming this Friday. The Niki Caro-directed action movie also stars Joseph Fiennes, Lucy Paez, Omari Hardwick, Paul Raci and Gael Garcia Bernal and was written by Andrea Berloff, Peter Craig and Misha Green.
On the documentary front, Netflix’s Queen Cleopatra docuseries, which launched on Wednesday, generated controversy even before its debut for its casting of British actress Adele James, who is of mixed heritage, as Cleopatra. Netflix describes the show, part of executive producer Jada Pinkett Smith’s look at prominent and iconic African queens and narrated by Pinkett Smith, as focusing on “the world’s most famous, powerful and misunderstood woman.”
“Cleopatra’s heritage has been the subject of much academic debate, which has often been ignored by Hollywood,” the streamer says. “Now our series re-assesses this fascinating part of her story.”
After the trailer dropped, some Egypt experts objected to Cleopatra’s portrayal in the series.
Anna Nicole Smith gets the documentary treatment starting May 16. The film, titled You Don’t Know Me and directed by Ursula Macfarlane (Harvey Weinstein doc Untouchable), explores the model’s life from her childhood to her rise to fame before her death in 2007, through never before seen footage, including home movies and interviews.
The next day, Netflix begins streaming the four-episode docuseries Working, hosted by Barack Obama and inspired by the Studs Terkel oral history of the same name. In the series, from Obama’s Higher Ground Productions, the former president visits workers across various levels in the home care, tech and hospitality industries, with the series exploring increasing inequality in the workforce and how these jobs affect the lives of the people doing them.
Netflix’s hit rom-com franchise To All the Boys gets a series spinoff in XO, Kitty, streaming May 18. The show follows Anna Cathcart’s Kitty, reprising her role as Lara Jean’s (Lana Condor) younger sister from the movies, as she journeys to the Korean Independent School of Seoul (KISS) to reunite with her long-distance boyfriend and finds herself making her own memories.
Romance will still be in the air by later in the month as Netflix drops a Queer Love installment of The Ultimatum, this time featuring couples made up of women and nonbinary people, each of whom identify as queer and find themselves at key moments in their relationships.
The streamer is also set to add new seasons of Queer Eye, Selling Sunset, All American and I Think You Should Leave With Tim Robinson.
And on the film front, Netflix subscribers will be able to stream St. Vincent, UglyDolls and Dirty Grandpa.
Missed what came to Netflix last month? Check out the April 2023 additions here.
Read on for the complete list of titles hitting Netflix this May.
May 1
Above Suspicion
Airport
Airport 1975
Airport ’77
American Gangster
Austin Powers: International Man of Mystery
Austin Powers: The Spy Who Shagged Me
Austin Powers in Goldmember
Black Hawk Down
The Cable Guy
Captain Phillips
Chicken Run
Cliffhanger
Conan the Barbarian
The Croods
The Curious Case of Benjamin Button
Dawn of the Dead
Flight
For Colored Girls
Girl, Interrupted
The Glass Castle
Home Again
Hop
Igor
Kindergarten Cop
Last Action Hero
Legends of the Fall
Lemony Snicket’s A Series of Unfortunate Events
Léon: The Professional
Marshall
Paranormal Activity
Peter Pan (2003)
Pitch Perfect
Rainbow High: Season 3
Rugrats: Seasons 1-2
The Smurfs: Season 1
Starship Troopers
Steel Magnolias
The Tale of Despereaux
This Is the End
Traffic
Vampires
The Wedding Date
The Young Victoria
May 2
Love Village
The Tailor
May 3
Great British Baking Show: Juniors: Season 7
Jewish Matchmaking
May 4
Arctic Dogs
Larva Family
Queen Charlotte: A Bridgerton Story
Sanctuary
May 6
A Man Called Otto
May 8
Justice League: Seasons 1-2
Justice League Unlimited: Seasons 1-2
Spirit Rangers: Season 2
May 9
Documentary Now!: Season 4
Hannah Gadsby: Something Special
May 10
Dance Brothers
Missing: Dead or Alive?
Queen Cleopatra
May 11
Royalteen: Princess Margrethe
St. Vincent
Ultraman: Season 3
May 12
Black Knight
Call Me Kate
The Mother
Mulligan
Queer Eye: Season 7
May 13
UglyDolls
May 16
Anna Nicole Smith: You Don’t Know Me
May 17
Faithfully Yours
Fanfic
La Reina del Sur: Season 3
McGregor Forever
Rhythm + Flow France: Season 2
Working: What We Do All Day
May 18
Kitti Katz
XO, Kitty
Yakitori: Soldiers of Misfortune
May 19
Astérix & Obélix: The Middle Kingdom
Kathal – A Jackfruit Mystery
Muted
Selling Sunset: Season 6
Young, Famous & African: Season 2
May 22
The Batman: Seasons 1-5
The Boss Baby
The Creature Cases: Chapter 3
May 23
All American: Season 5
MerPeople
Victim/Suspect
Wanda Sykes: I’m An Entertainer
May 24
Hard Feelings
Mother’s Day
The Ultimatum: Queer Love
May 25
FUBAR
May 26
Barbecue Showdown: Season 2
Blood & Gold
Dirty Grandpa
Tin & Tina
Turn of the Tide
May 30
I Think You Should Leave with Tim Robinson: Season 3
May 31
Heartland Season 15
Mixed by Erry