The Grand Tour Top Gear

James May: BBC has double standards

Ex Top Gear presenter James May considers it unfair to Chris Evans that the BBC chose to air a ‘brilliant’ Top Gear compilations during the Christmas holidays. May has accused the BBC of double standards, suggesting that it was unfair of them to air the two-part Christmas special, showcasing how brilliant the previous version of Top Gear was.

He told Radio Times: “The BBC may have ruled me out, but I don’t rule out the BBC. I was surprised they showed lots of Top Gear compilations over Christmas. I thought, ‘Oh, so now they’re celebrating us,’ but I also thought it’s harsh on Chris Evans. Just as he’s trying to launch his version of the programme, the BBC is saying, ‘Look how brilliant it was before.'”

As you’ve most likely read already, rumours are swirling that the new Evans’s version of the show, due to begin May 8th, is going anything but smoothly. The BBC insists that production is on schedule, and some sources suspect that rumours about Evans may have emanated from the camp of one of the show’s former hosts. One show insider said that tabloid claims that Evans was unable to talk to the camera while driving were “absolute nonsense”, adding that the corporation planned to release footage of the presenter doing just that.

May also said: “I’d like to see Chris’s Top Gear do well. It’s a ballsy call to continue it. I wouldn’t want to be the one presenting it when we’d just finished, but there must be a way of reinventing it. We always said it would survive beyond us. I think the stories about Chris’s version being in trouble might be an elaborate hoax, before it explodes onto our screens in brilliance.”

Frustratingly, May again refused to respond on the specifics of the new Amazon show, although he said it definitely wouldn’t be called Gear Knobs. Other then that, he did mention that he broke his right arm last autumn, after he fell over, but also said he simply couldn’t see how his new Amazon show could fail. “How could it? There are too many people who like us messing around with cars. It would need some sudden seismic viewing shift, for reasons no one could possibly understand. Nor can it detract from what we achieved with Top Gear, because we won’t be just another version on another platform. What’s the point?”

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