Friends have already started texting him.

Some haven’t seen Theo Wilson in years. Some live across the country and others also call Colorado home. To each of them, the face on TV looks familiar, so they want to know.

Was that him on History Channel in a commercial between episodes of “Ancient Aliens” and “Swamp People”?

Yes, Wilson responds. It was him.

It’s his face in the commercials promoting a new show, called “I Was There,” which counts ABC’s “Good Morning America” anchor George Stephanopoulos as executive producer and which aims to revisit historical events, disasters and triumphs in a way that, as the title suggests, places viewers there in the moment.

“We’re taking the biggest turning points in history and dissecting the lost surprises of what happened,” Wilson, the show’s host, says while looking at the camera during a promo. “You have to see it to believe it. Now, you will.”

In an interview, the Denver-area native and resident shared another version of the show’s elevator pitch.

“It’s the historical events you do know from an angle you don’t know,” he said.

In the first season, each of the 12 episodes will look back on events such as the Salem witch trials, Bloody Sunday and the assassination of Abraham Lincoln. The show will air two special episodes on Sunday and Monday before the official premiere Feb. 28. Future episodes will air on Monday evenings.

The promo offers a peek into the show’s unique format, featuring dramatically re-created scenes using actors and CGI technology. Then there’s Wilson. He pops in serving the role of what he calls a “time-traveling tour guide.”

As scenes unfold, Wilson can be seen standing in the theater as he narrates details about the gun John Wilkes Booth used to assassinate Lincoln or sitting in the church pew explaining a minister’s sermon during the time of the Salem witch trials. These snippets are combined with documentary-style interviews with experts and archival footage.

Other episodes will cover the Hindenberg disaster, the Oklahoma City bombing and the story behind outlaw robber Jesse James.

This will be the first TV gig for Wilson.

He landed the show after landing a deal with an agent after his 2017 TED Talk titled “A Black Man Goes Undercover in the Alt Right” went viral.

The agent liked his voice and look. Wilson has a background in using his voice as a founding member of a Denver slam poetry group that won the National Poetry Slam and as the current executive director of Shop Talk Live, an organization that uses the barber shop as a setting for community dialogue.

Wilson’s background also includes a connection to history. He’s the grandson of a Tuskegee Airman and the son of an avid historian.

“Growing up in that, you learn from osmosis,” he said. “You just happen to know stuff. So you’re the kid who raises his hand in history class.”

Wilson says “I Was There” isn’t just about telling stories from the past. It’s also about what we can learn from how history repeats itself.

A news release for the show poses two questions: “What would it mean to be transported to that period and live through it? What will we tell future generations about what we lived through when they say I wonder what it was like to…?”

Wilson hopes viewers keep those two questions in mind as they watch.

“I hope people take curiosity from it,” he said. “When you’re talking about history, you hope people get a clearer lens to view the present.”