Netflix has acquired worldwide rights to the Australian drama series The Airport Chaplain, starring Hugo Weaving, with the eight-part series set to reach audiences in over 190 countries and regions. The deal, reported exclusively by Deadline, excludes Australia, where the show will air on broadcaster SBS and its streaming service SBS On Demand.

The series launches on 26 August 2026, day-and-date — meaning Netflix and SBS release it on the same day — giving Australian and international viewers simultaneous access.

Weaving plays Tobias Wallace, an unconventional airport terminal chaplain described by the actor himself as "a flawed but deeply humane character who struggles to separate himself from the emotional terrain of the airport" (Deadline). Shabana Azeez co-stars as Mira, the terminal manager and Wallace's boss. The ensemble cast also includes Claudia Karvan, Thomas Weatherall, Erroll Shand, Kavitha Anandasivam, Jackson Tozer, Elias Anton, Arka Das, Fanny Hanusin, Echo Palo, Nicholas Denton, George Mason, Brenna Harding, Michael Logo, Priscilla Doueihy, Claude Jabbour, and Ras-Samuel Welda'abzgi.

The show comes from Sydney-based production house Wooden Horse, though filming took place in Victoria, Australia (Ausfilm). Screenwriter Elise McCredie created the series and serves as an executive producer alongside Wooden Horse co-founders Jude Troy and Richard Finlayson. Alex Cameron is co-producer, Nakul Legha of SBS is an executive producer, and Bonnie Moir and Tig Terera directed episodes.

The origin story is disarmingly simple. Troy, one of Wooden Horse's founders, had a chance encounter with a chaplain at Melbourne Airport who helped her recover a lost handbag. That interaction planted the seed for the series. Troy has said Wooden Horse's founding mission was "to take premium scripted Australian stories to a global audience" (Deadline). The Netflix deal puts that mission into practice in the most literal way possible.

The Airport Chaplain was first unveiled at the Series Mania festival in 2025 and later announced at SBS's Upfront event in early 2026 (Inside Film). Before its streaming debut, the series will have its world premiere at the Melbourne International Film Festival.

Development on a second season is already underway, according to Deadline — an early signal of confidence in the property before a single episode has aired publicly.

For viewers outside Australia, 26 August marks the first chance to watch. For the Australian audience, the SBS and Netflix releases land on the same day, meaning no waiting period between the local broadcast and the global streaming window.

What makes this stand out is the scale of the reach. A drama born from a lost handbag at Melbourne Airport, shot in Victoria, commissioned by an Australian broadcaster, will be available to Netflix subscribers across more than 190 countries and regions on the same day it premieres at home. That is the streaming-era distribution model in one clean example.