Human voice of reason John Oliver to play bird voice of reason in 'The Lion King'

Millions of Americans look to John Oliver as a voice of reason in trying times, and now it appears the animal kingdom will be doing the same.

The Last Week Tonight host is joining Disney's The Lion King in the voice of Zazu, the avian worrywart who serves as advisor to lion kings Mufasa, Scar, and Simba.

The Wrap broke the news. Donald Glover leads the Lion King voice cast as Simba. James Earl Jones plays Mufasa, reprising his role from the 1994 animated movie. Also set to star are Seth Rogen and Billy Eichner as Pumbaa and Timon, respectively.

Jon Favreau is directing the new Lion King, which is billed as a "live-action" remake. In this case, however, "live-action" really just means hyperrealistic CG animation -- think Disney's recent re-do of The Jungle Book, also directed by Favreau.

In any case, Oliver seems like pretty perfect casting. Indeed, it kinda feels like he's playing the role on HBO each Sunday night. He offers up wise advice that we don't always want to hear, and we listen to him some of the time but ignore him way too much of the time.

Which I guess makes us Simba in this scenario. Could be worse -- we just need to make sure we're not ignoring John Oliver so much that we turn into Scar.

The Lion King arrives July 19, 2019.