'Courage' special brings author Brené Brown to Netflix

Brené Brown's books on shame, vulnerability and courage have given her A-list fans like Oprah and Melinda Gates and made her a go-to leadership consultant for both Pixar and the Seattle Seahawks.

But Brown, a research professor at the University of Houston's Graduate College of Social Work, thought she'd spend her career writing for other academics, not making the New York Times' best-seller list.

"My goal was to put it in peer-reviewed articles that no one would read but like five people and they would just read it to check to make sure they were quoted," Brown told The Associated Press from her home in Houston.

Research professor Brene Brown, star of the Netflix special "Brene Brown: The Call to Courage," poses for a portrait at Netflix's Hollywood offices, Tuesday, April 16, 2019, in Los Angeles. (Photo by Chris PizzelloInvisionAP)

Five best-selling books later, Brown is debuting her first Netflix special on Friday, "Brené Brown: The Call to Courage ," based off her two decades of research. The special is a bit of an experiment for the streaming service, whose categories Brown doesn't neatly fit into.

"Am I comedy? Documentary? True crime?" Brown joked.

Brown's skill as a writer and speaker is that she doesn't sound like a typical self-help or leadership expert who is shouting motivational speaker mantras. She has a researcher's mind for patterns and a storyteller's gift of language. She peppers her talks with plenty of Texas colloquialisms, like "There's nothing in the middle of the road but white stripes and dead armadillos." She tells personal anecdotes about her kids and her husband to illustrate her broader ideas about parenting, compassion, leadership and more.

Research professor Brene Brown, star of the Netflix special "Brene Brown: The Call to Courage," poses for a portrait at Netflix's Hollywood offices, Tuesday, April 16, 2019, in Los Angeles. (Photo by Chris PizzelloInvisionAP)

"People will come up to me and say, 'I already knew everything you said. I just didn't have the language to say it. I didn't know we were allowed to talk about it,'" said Brown. "And so I think I just put language around feelings and experiences and thoughts that we all have."

She can also curse like a true Southern lady, which is just enough to set people at ease and give them a laugh. "Not like Andrew Dice Clay," she said. "An appropriate amount of cursing."

In the special she talks about her 2010 speech at a TEDxHouston conference on vulnerability that has become one of the most watched TED Talk speeches, now viewed about 39 million times. Her most recent book, "Dare to Lead: Brave Work. Tough Conversations. Whole Hearts," is a playbook for leading with empathy.

Research professor Brene Brown, star of the Netflix special "Brene Brown: The Call to Courage," poses for a portrait at Netflix's Hollywood offices, Tuesday, April 16, 2019, in Los Angeles. (Photo by Chris PizzelloInvisionAP)

When asked about leadership qualities she hopes to see among candidates for the upcoming 2020 U.S. presidential election, Brown took a long pause.

"I am one-inch away from being completely disenchanted with politics but I'm holding on. I'm white-knuckling it right now," Brown said. "I need a political system where the people who make the decisions actually are required to live by them and are not in such an elite position where they make policy and laws and financial decisions that don't affect them."

The Netflix special is good timing for Brown, who has spent years traveling all over the country giving speeches to corporations, entrepreneurs, women's conferences and leadership training events.

Research professor Brene Brown, star of the Netflix special "Brene Brown: The Call to Courage," poses for a portrait at Netflix's Hollywood offices, Tuesday, April 16, 2019, in Los Angeles. (Photo by Chris PizzelloInvisionAP)

Her youngest child is in middle school and she's moving into a period of her career where she's doing less of those speaking opportunities in order to be at home. But with Netflix, she has a chance to continue building on the conversations she started with her books.

"This opportunity from Netflix just felt like such a deeply important gift," Brown said. "This thing is going to drop in 190 countries."

Online:

Research professor Brene Brown, star of the Netflix special "Brene Brown: The Call to Courage," poses for a portrait at Netflix's Hollywood offices, Tuesday, April 16, 2019, in Los Angeles. (Photo by Chris PizzelloInvisionAP)

https://brenebrown.com/

Research professor Brene Brown, star of the Netflix special "Brene Brown: The Call to Courage," poses for a portrait at Netflix's Hollywood offices, Tuesday, April 16, 2019, in Los Angeles. (Photo by Chris PizzelloInvisionAP)

Research professor Brene Brown, star of the Netflix special "Brene Brown: The Call to Courage," poses for a portrait at Netflix's Hollywood offices, Tuesday, April 16, 2019, in Los Angeles. (Photo by Chris PizzelloInvisionAP)

One U.S. service member was rescued and at least one was missing after two U.S. military planes went down in separate incidents including the first shoot-down since the war began nearly five weeks ago.

It was the first time U.S. aircraft have been downed in the conflict and came just two days after President Donald Trump said in a national address that the U.S. has “beaten and completely decimated Iran.”

One fighter jet was shot down in Iran, officials said. A U.S. crew member from that plane was rescued, but a second was missing, and a U.S. military search-and-rescue operation was underway.

Separately, Iranian state media said a U.S. A-10 attack aircraft crashed in the Persian Gulf after being struck by Iranian defense forces. A U.S. official, speaking on condition of anonymity to discuss a sensitive military situation, said it was not clear if the aircraft crashed or was shot down.

The war now entering its sixth week is destabilizing economies around the world as Iran responds to the U.S. and Israeli attacks by targeting the Gulf region's energy infrastructure and tightening its grip on oil and natural gas shipments through the Strait of Hormuz.

Here is the latest:

The Iranian judiciary's Mizan news agency said Saturday that the two men who were hanged belonged to the Iranian exile group Mujahedeen-e-Khalq.

The agency said Abul-Hassan Montazer and Vahid Bani-Amirian were convicted of “being members of a terrorist group.”

This brings to six the total number of MEK members executed since the start of the war.

Activists and rights groups say Iran routinely holds closed-door trials in which defendants are unable to challenge the accusations they face.

The Israeli military said on Saturday that its air force struck ballistic and and anti-aircraft missile storage sites in Tehran.

It said the strikes a day earlier included weapons manufacture sites as well as military research and development facilities in the Iranian capital.

It said the strikes are part of an ongoing phase to increase damage to Iran's “core systems and foundations.”

Authorities in Dubai said the facades of two buildings were damaged by debris from intercepted drones, including one belonging to U.S. tech firm Oracle. No injuries were reported.

Iran’s Revolutionary Guard has threatened to attack Oracle and 17 other U.S. companies after accusing them of being involved in “terrorist espionage” operations in Iran.

Previous Iranian drone strikes caused damage to three Amazon Web Services facilities in the United Arab Emirates and Bahrain.

As of Friday, 247 of the wounded were Army soldiers, 63 were Navy sailors, 19 were Marines and 36 were Air Force airmen, according to Pentagon data available online.

It is unclear if the data includes any of the service members involved in the downing of two combat aircraft reported Friday.

Most of the wounded — 200 — were also mid to senior enlisted troops, 85 were officers and 80 were junior enlisted service members.

The current death toll remains at 13 service members killed in combat.

Palestinian Muslims attend Friday prayers outside Jerusalem's Old City due to restrictions linked to the Iran war, April 3, 2026. (AP Photo/Mahmoud Illean)

Tamara and her sister Amal color pictures on the floor as their parents, Sara and Ahmed, who fled their village of Khiyam in southern Lebanon due to Israeli bombardment, sit inside a tent used as a shelter in Beirut, Lebanon, Friday, April 3, 2026. (AP Photo/Emilio Morenatti)

Mohammad Qubaisi, 53, with burn wounds from an Israeli airstrike on southern Lebanon undergoes surgery by Dr. Mohammed Ziara, left, and his team, at the Sidon Government Hospital in Sidon, Lebanon, Thursday, April 2, 2026. (AP Photo/Emilio Morenatti)

A bridge struck by U.S. airstrikes on Thursday is seen in the town of Karaj, west of Tehran, Iran, Friday, April 3, 2026. (AP Photo/Vahid Salemi)

FILE - An F-15E Strike Eagle turns toward the Panamint range over Death Valley National Park, Calif., on Feb. 27, 2017. (AP Photo/Ben Margot, File)