James May has said his former show Top Gear was ‘very much of its time’, and suggested that a change to the format would be needed to bring the motoring series back to TV.
The BBC ‘rested’ Top Gear for the foreseeable future after Freddie Flintoff was injured in a crash on the test track at Dunsfold Aerodrome in Surrey during filming in December 2022.
May, who presented Top Gear with Jeremy Clarkson and Richard Hammond before the trio left to host Prime Video’s The Grand Tour, has now said he thinks the long-running motoring show is unlikely to keep to the same format when it returns.
The 61-year-old told The Telegraph: ‘Top Gear was very much of its time. Social attitudes towards the car have changed quite a bit. These days, it’s become more political.’
May also said Top Gear was not ‘sexist or misogynistic’, in defence of criticism from when the trio hosted the programme.
‘It was just painfully honest,’ he added.
‘It was a view of the world, distorted through the eyes of people who were unreasonably concerned about cars.’
May also claimed the trio, who signed off with the final episode of The Grand Tour last month, ‘were quite metrosexual’ during their time on Top Gear, and said Clarkson’s role was to make controversial comments.
The series received criticism from the Mexican ambassador, the Indian high commissioner in London, and Argentine officials during the trio’s tenure.
May said: ‘I didn’t wince about Clarkson being controversial because it’s his job to be an arse and he is very good at it.
‘I’d wince at him not misunderstanding some basic principle of aerodynamics. I’d think, “how can you not know that?”‘
The title of his next show, James May And The Dull Men’s Club, on Quest, comes from how male hobbies and roles can be viewed by society, May said, adding: ‘It’s a bit farty to say this, but what used to be considered the attributes of basic manliness are being mocked.’
He also said it is about men finding solutions to everyday technical issues in his workshop.
‘The idea of being thorough, or being able to make things or use tools: it’s all considered a bit “dad”, a bit dull.
‘So in the show we decided to headbutt it by being interesting about being dull while acknowledging that everyone thinks the things we do are dull.’
This comes after May said he thinks the time is right for a brand new motoring show to take the place of Top Gear and The Grand Tour, because the trio are ‘too old’.
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He did however offer some hope about the trio reuniting on another project, elsewhere saying: ‘I wouldn’t rule it out, but you do have to bear in mind that we’re all getting on a bit.’
Meanwhile Clarkson, 64, claimed he was too ‘unfit and fat and old’ for filming some parts of The Grand Tour anymore, adding: ‘I’ve driven cars higher than anyone else and further north than anyone else.
‘We’ve done everything you can do with a car. When we had meetings about what to do next, people just threw their arms in the air.’
Flintoff, who hosted Top Gear with Paddy McGuinness and Chris Harris before production was paused, has made a steady return to the public eye since his accident, and was recently seen in the four-part BBC TV series Freddie Flintoff’s Field Of Dreams On Tour.
He admitted it had been ‘a lot harder than I thought’ to shake off the crash, and said he had struggled with anxiety, nightmares, and flashbacks.
The Grand Tour: One for the Road is available to watch on Prime Video.
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