'The Big Picture with Kal Penn' Premieres on March 30, 2015 

NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC CHANNEL AND ACCLAIMED ACTOR KAL PENN EXPLORE THE HIDDEN WAYS INFORMATION, DATA AND MAPS PROVIDE INSIGHT INTO THE WORLD AROUND US … AND OUR DAILY LIVES

(Washington, D.C. – March 4, 2015) With the explosion of infographics and big data, maps aren’t just about geography anymore. They can tell us all kinds of things about the human experience. National Geographic Channel’s (NGC’s) new series The Big Picture With Kal Penn is all about finding the unexpected — and sometimes surprising — realities in both the world at large and our own backyard, revealed by crunching the numbers and finding new ways to visualize data. Produced by National Geographic Studios, The Big Picture With Kal Penn premieres on Monday, March 30, at 9 p.m. ET/PT on NGC, and will air internationally on National Geographic Channel in 170 countries and 45 languages. For more information, visit natgeotv.com and follow us on Twitter at @NGC_PR.

Host and producer Kal Penn (@kalpenn) will take viewers on a journey to understand how things like money, sex, food, sports and crime influence our daily lives. Exploring and generating infographics from information banks and data analyses, The Big Picture With Kal Penn will investigate different themes through the mapping of new data, the creative visualization of information and in-depth personal stories with fascinating characters.

Infographics, big data visualizations and maps are not the only tools used to bring the world alive. Documentary vignettes will tell stories that make the connections personal, introducing the real people who live and work at key intersections of each theme being explored. And Penn will serve as our guide, making the information relatable to the everyday viewer.

Kal Penn is known for his starring roles in “House,” “How I Met Your Mother,” and, of course, the “Harold and Kumar” franchise, among others. Originally from New Jersey, Penn received his undergraduate degree in sociology, theater, film and television at the University of California, Los Angeles, and a graduate certificate in international security from Stanford University.

Having most recently hosted the Discovery Channel’s “The Big Brain Theory,” a competition to find the nation\'s brightest engineer, Penn stars in the CBS drama “Battle Creek” for Vince Gilligan and David Shore, which premiered March 1. He recently wrapped up production on a number of independent films, including “Sisterhood of Night,” “Outliving Emily,” “Dementemania” and “Stereotypically You.”

From 2009 to 2011, Penn took a sabbatical from acting, and served as an associate director of the White House Office of Public Engagement, where he focused primarily on outreach related to young

Americans, including related issues such as the Affordable Care Act, repeal of Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell,

and veterans benefits for service members returning from Iraq and Afghanistan.

On the big screen, Penn has starred in various independent films and blockbusters. The New York Times called his lead role in Mira Nair\'s “The Namesake

a “crackling, star-making performance.” Penn also has taught courses at the University of Pennsylvania and the University of California, Los Angeles. 

Like it or not, our lives are shaped by the biggest and most powerful business on the planet: crime. This episode will delve into how the small, rural town of St. Albans, Vermont, is making big money for drug dealers; how the local economy in Canon City, Colorado, benefits from incarceration; and how the gangs in Washington, D.C., compete to control territory, a fight that is happening more and more through social media.

There are billions of dollars out there — you just have to know where to look. We’re on a quest to dig up the goods, from the most remote ends of the earth to our own backyards. And we’re charting a course to where X really does mark the spot of buried treasure. We’ll travel to northeastern Nevada, where more gold has been found than in the entire California Gold Rush. And in Defiance, Ohio, we’ll meet a family who discovered a bin of old baseball cards and found out that these rare collectibles are worth millions. Finally, we journey to Lodz, Poland, with treasure hunters seeking gold and jewels thought to be lost forever from World War II.

All sex is not created equal, and some places are blessed with more of it than others. We travel to Hurley, Wisconsin, a town with the unlikely distinction of being the Strip Club Capital of America. Know where to find the fastest-growing group of sexually active people? We head to Delray Beach, Florida, where senior citizens are turning retirement communities into sexual meccas. And as more countries experiment with legalized prostitution, we journey to Switzerland, to a drive-in brothel in Zurich.

When an idea goes viral, it spreads like a disease. When a sickness goes viral, all of us are at risk. Whether it starts with animals, humans or bombs, how can we improve our chances of surviving the next global pandemic? At the Centers for Disease Control headquarters in Atlanta, a researcher studies mosquitoes (the world’s most dangerous animals) by letting them suck blood from his arms. Starting in the Hong Kong hotel where SARS turned into an epidemic, we trace how the disease spread worldwide. In a top secret U.S. government lab in Los Alamos, New Mexico, researchers track biological weapons around the world and map their potential impact.

Data and number crunching have taken over the world of sports. The highest proportion of NFL players comes from the small towns of the Louisiana bayou, thanks to a unique combination of roads, talent and history. We travel to Argentina to meet the highly organized soccer hooligans of Buenos Aires, who look more like a mafia than a fan club. Picking a name and mascot for your team is a serious business. Is it better to go for a top name (“‘Eagles” is most popular in the U.S.) or a rare one?

THE BIG PICTURE WITH KAL PENN: Surviving Nature’s Fury

As we build an overlapping map of natural disaster threats around the world, we make an unsettling discovery: Mother Nature has handed us our eviction notice, and almost no place is truly safe. Drought is a major threat around the world, and in San Angelo, Texas, pilots are fighting back by seeding the clouds to create weather the local ranchers desperately need. We travel to Iceland to delve into a town on the edge of a volcano where residents dodge molten lava and constantly rebuild as eruptions eat their property. The U.S. has more damaging weather and disaster threats than any other nation, and the epicenter of it all is New Madrid, Missouri, home to the biggest earthquake in American history, along with a laundry list of other potentially deadly natural disasters.

The Big Picture With Kal Penn is produced by National Geographic Studios for National Geographic Channel. For National Geographic Studios, Brooke Runnette, Jeff Hasler, Brian Lovett and David Konschnik are executive producers. Kal Penn is producer. For National Geographic Channel, Michael J. Miller is executive producer; Kevin Tao Mohs is vice president, production and development; Alan Eyres is senior vice president, programming and development; and Tim Pastore is president, original programming and production.

Based at the National Geographic Society headquarters in Washington, D.C., the National Geographic Channels US are a joint venture between National Geographic and Fox Networks. The Channels contribute to the National Geographic Society’s commitment to exploration, conservation and education with smart, innovative programming and profits that directly support its mission. Launched in January 2001, National Geographic Channel (NGC) celebrated its fifth anniversary with the debut of NGC HD. In 2010, the wildlife and natural history cable channel Nat Geo WILD was launched, and in 2011, the Spanish-language network Nat Geo Mundo was unveiled. The Channels have carriage with all of the nation’s major cable, telco and satellite television providers, with NGC currently available in over 85 million U.S. homes. Globally, National Geographic Channel is available in more than 440 million homes in 171 countries and 45 languages. For more information, visit www.natgeotv.com.

Jennifer DeGuzman, National Geographic Channel, 212-378-1965,