This is what Zach Galifianakis loves about gardening: “The miracles that you get to see – small, little miracles that we take for granted.”

Wait. Was this a bit? The American actor and comedian is best known for the deliberately stressful interview show Between Two Ferns (2008 to 2018) and for prickly, provocative fare like the TV series Baskets (2016 to 2019) and The Hangover (2009 to 2013) movies. So this earnestness could have been mistaken for a gag. But Galifianakis, an avid gardener, meant every word.

At his home in rural British Columbia in Canada, he grows myriad fruits and vegetables. He has beekeeping aspirations. On-screen, he is rarely serene, but gardening calms him.

“All the gardens I visit, there’s always peace there,” he said. “When you see nature making sense, it’s really fulfilling.” He is at his happiest, he said, when he is down and dirty.

That philosophy made Galifianakis, 56, the natural choice to host This Is A Gardening Show, a short-format how-to show that premiered on Netflix on Earth Day on April 22. 

“Gardening shouldn’t be for a niche group, and everybody deserves to grow their own food,” said Chris Kim, a creator of the show. “Who would be the perfect person to represent all of us who have dumb questions, silly questions?”

That person was Galifianakis. “Gardening can be awkward, but so are his jokes,” Kim said.

The episodes alternate segments in which Galifianakis learns from expert gardeners and others in which he interviews school-age children. The tone is zippy and family-friendly, though Galifianakis still offers jokes about poop, drugs and suicide.

“How is this funny?” one child asks him.