CNN’s “This Is Life with Lisa Ling” will return for its third season on Sunday, Sept. 25 at 10 p.m., TheWrap has exclusively learned.
Pending breaking news, the third season of Ling’s show will air on the eve of the first scheduled presidential debate between Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton, providing CNN viewers with a nice break from election coverage.
Ling will explore the L.A. County jail, step inside the cage with MMA fighters, attend a prison wedding, learn coding with Silicon Valley teens and examine legal prostitution in Nevada during the eight-episode season that brings Ling to communities that are unusual, extraordinary and sometimes dangerous. She will also uncover state laws that allow rapists parental rights, examine the heroin epidemic in Chicago and embed with the Philadelphia Police Department.
As Ling prepares for the birth of her second child, CNNMoney will also release a five-part digital series, “This is Birth with Lisa Ling,” that explores how inconsistent healthcare legislation, income inequality and cultural shifts are changing how people have children in America. The five-episode series will be released all at once on Monday, Sept. 19.
“This is Life” is part of a huge slate of original programming, as CNN Worldwide president Jeff Zucker looks to expand the network’s content library. “Anthony Bourdain: Parts Unknown,” “The Eighties,” “Declassified,” “The Hunt with John Walsh,” “Morgan Spurlock Inside Man” and “The Wonder List with Bill Weir” are also among the network’s original programs.
CNN had a huge month in July, growing 226 percent to win prime time in the key demographic of adults age 25-54, averaging 568,000 viewers between 8 p.m. and 11 p.m. ET.
Watch the first trailer for Season 3 of the docuseries below.