Top Gear Boss On Show's Meteoric Rise, BBC Exit & Clarkson Sacking | Andy Wilman (E382)

Summary

Podcast Summary: The High Performance Podcast

Episode: Top Gear Boss On Show's Meteoric Rise, BBC Exit & Clarkson Sacking | Andy Wilman (E382)
Release Date: December 8, 2025
Host: Jake Humphrey
Guest: Andy Wilman (Former Executive Producer of Top Gear and The Grand Tour)

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Episode Overview

This episode delves deep into the meteoric rise of Top Gear under Andy Wilman and Jeremy Clarkson, its innovative reinvention, the organic development of its legendary trio, the pressures and pitfalls of unexpected global success, and the dramatic BBC exit following the widely publicized Jeremy Clarkson incident. Wilman candidly discusses the creative processes behind the show, the chaotic and accidental nature of its evolution, issues of leadership under intense pressure, mental health struggles, controversies, and ultimately, the show’s end and rebirth.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. The Genesis and Reinvention of Top Gear

• Clarkson’s Vision:

  • Clarkson, at heart a “tabloid daily newspaper journalist” with an innate sense for stories ([04:00]), devised 70% of the new Top Gear format on scraps of paper in a pub. Key concepts included filming in a hangar for an authentic base, building a test track for real car performance, and introducing competitive elements like lap boards ([05:40]).

• Innovative Changes:

  • Only test cars that are available in the UK to move away from exclusives aimed at “niche nerds” and focus on a broader television audience ([07:00]).
  • Creation of the 'news' segment for concise mainstream car updates, freeing airtime for the show’s signature big and often outrageous features ([09:00]).
  • The organic development of the trio was unplanned. Initially, only Jeremy was a known quantity—the rest came from an open, sometimes bizarre audition process ([11:00]).

2. Accidental Alchemy: The Trio

• Richard Hammond’s Audition:

  • Hammond’s successful audition stemmed from endearing self-deprecation and comic storytelling, not polished TV skills, setting the tone for the group’s dynamic ([15:35]).

• Evolution of Relationships:

  • The chemistry between Clarkson, Hammond, and May developed over several series—“lightning in a bottle”—and was given time by the BBC, creating completely authentic on-screen camaraderie ([22:01]).

• Quote:

  • "It was lightning in a bottle… We consciously did it, but the level it got to, we never saw that coming." — Andy Wilman ([22:11])

3. Creative Process and Show Structure

• Mischief & Maverick Ideas:
  • The culture of “piss about” experimentation led to memorable stunts and comedic moments, inspired by a 'Fast Show'-style punchline mentality.
  • Classic idea reversal: “How many bikes can a bus jump?” instead of vice versa ([18:24]).
  • Chaos became content: mechanical failures and real-life calamity often made the best TV—in stark opposition to typical broadcast thinking ([27:04]).
  • The success of “building an aircraft carrier for jokes” only works if rooted in a relatable premise—never just randomness ([24:00]).

4. Pressure, Leadership & Mental Health

• Sudden Success and It’s Toll:

  • Massive ratings meant BBC attention and overnight figures dictated everything; expectations soared ([37:01]).
  • Leadership style was consciously modeled after “David Brent” in terms of fostering a fun, bonded culture—but Wilman admits failures to delegate and safeguard well-being as the workload and show grew enormous ([37:32]).

• Quote:

  • “Failure was celebrated. It meant to hurt and then it was celebrated, you know, so we had a good vibe… but the rest of it, I would say we didn’t do very well because… when the show took off… the pressure becomes nasty.” — Andy Wilman ([38:55])

• Burnout:

  • Regularly working until 2 or 3 AM, worsening home life, using antidepressants, and creating a hamster wheel of self-imposed standards ([50:02]).

5. Controversies, Ego, and On-Screen Accidents

• Controversial Editorial Decisions:

  • Allowed to push boundaries (“lorry drivers murder prostitutes”) but lines were crossed during the ill-fated ‘Mexico’ jokes, resulting in “death threats piling in from Mexico.” The Mexican ambassador’s diplomatic grace forced a reckoning ([44:00]).
  • The “slope” joke incident marked a breakdown in internal controls—Wilman admits by this time, they had developed a sense of entitlement, disregarding usual editorial review ([46:00]).

• Responsibility for Dangerous Stunts:

  • Richard Hammond’s various crashes, especially the Rimac accident, were deeply traumatizing for Wilman, fueling a growing awareness of their finite luck ([52:40], [54:38]).

• Quote:

  • “I did have those thoughts. It was on me, you know, in my head. I am the one who’s gonna have killed him. How can I live with myself anymore?” — Andy Wilman ([56:11])

6. The End: BBC Exit & Clarkson Sacking

• Fallout from the “Fracas:”

  • Clarkson turned himself in after the incident. For Wilman, it was clear the show was collapsing internally from workload, deadlines, and exhaustion ([73:43]).
  • BBC’s firing of Clarkson came suddenly for the team—they learned of it on TV, emblematic of the detachment between production and management ([78:17]).
  • BBC tried to retain Wilman, May, and Hammond, but loyalty held—eventually paving the way for the Amazon deal ([83:19]).

• Quote:

  • “I was polite, but then I had put my hand upon notice in going, I can’t do this. You know, I’m not doing it without him. I’m not making a Top Gear. Cause it isn’t a show. It’s the thing we made.” — Andy Wilman ([81:20])

7. Notable Top Gear Moments

• Favorite Specials:
  • Personal highlights: Burma and Middle East specials, filmed in areas now ravaged by conflict, representing a window into a more open world ([57:46], [58:40]).
• The Creation of The Stig:
  • Born out of necessity and a Pulp Fiction reference, The Stig was conceptualized as a non-speaking, anonymous driver—an idea originally called “the Gimp" before being renamed ([62:59], [64:43]).

8. The Legacy and Aftermath

• Impact and Irreplaceability:
  • Wilman believes the magic of Top Gear was unique, a product of timing, team, and the BBC’s initial indifference which allowed creative freedom ([86:19]).
  • Both Top Gear and The Grand Tour are now over, and Wilman is skeptical anything similar will return unless someone inside the BBC has the drive to revive it ([86:47]).

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• On Chemistry:
  • "It was lightning in a bottle… We consciously did it, but the level it got to, we never saw that coming."
    — Andy Wilman ([22:11])
• On the creative process:
  • “We kind of—I don’t want to be rude…feels to me like you’re stumbling into the success that Top Gear became.”
    — Host ([17:16])
  • “Yeah, it’s fully—that whole book is about accidents. Accidents all the way.”
    — Andy Wilman ([17:35])
• On the importance of authenticity:
  • "Viewers can spot it when it’s like a TV relationship. And we were allowed quite a few series for that to just develop.”
    — Andy Wilman ([22:59])
• On Responsibility & Burnout:
  • “You take the antidepressants, but not the warning that came with it. I didn’t think burnout. I didn’t allow the thought that burnout could exist…that film’s not as good as the last one. And how are we going to keep 8 million viewers? … We couldn’t enjoy any of it.”
    — Andy Wilman ([50:08], [51:02])
• On Clarkson’s Sacking:
  • “It’s the show. The show’s become everything to us for all the reasons I’ve said, be it through our insecurities or whatever. And that's what’s going down the bog now. So…maybe it was a full stop.”
    — Andy Wilman ([77:03])

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Timestamps for Important Segments

• [05:40] Jeremy Clarkson’s founding vision for Top Gear’s reboot
• [11:32] Early group chemistry, the arrival of Hammond
• [15:35] Hammond’s self-deprecating, successful audition
• [22:11] “Lightning in a bottle”—the trio’s accidental chemistry
• [24:00] Editorial rules: the importance of a relatable premise
• [27:04] When chaos became the film: embracing TV mishaps
• [44:00] After Mexico jokes: the power of diplomacy and learning from mistakes
• [52:40] Emotional aftermath of Hammond’s Rimac crash
• [73:43] Inside the last, collapsing season of Top Gear
• [76:15] The day BBC fires Clarkson—team learns via TV news
• [81:20] Wilman on refusing to continue Top Gear without Clarkson
• [84:26] The business and loyalty around keeping the trio together
• [86:55] Wilman’s verdict: motoring shows are gone for now

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Tone and Style

Andy Wilman is honest, self-deprecating, and unsparing about his and the team’s flaws. He celebrates happy accidents, acknowledges luck as much as vision, and describes the risks and pressures candidly. There’s deep affection and pride for the team, and moments of emotion, especially when discussing mental health, the end of the show, and the fate of Michael Schumacher.

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Useful for Listeners Who Haven't Heard the Episode

This summary captures the arc of Top Gear’s history from reinvention to demise, uncovers the mechanics of its success, the organic formation of its famed trio, notorious challenges and missteps, and offers personal leadership lessons about pressure, ego, and burnout. Through vivid storytelling and candid reflection, it gives a compelling behind-the-scenes look at what made Top Gear tick—and why its formula is hard to replicate.

Transcript

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We get all the.

[Andy Wilman]

Death threats piling in from Mexico and I'll do a little run up how this all starts to come to be death threats. Oh, tons. It was on me, you know, in my head. I'm the one who's gonna have killed him. How can I live with myself anymore? You know, it was like that. Do you realize how much our show was falling apart? The seams, the wheels were coming off. He knew this now this huge thing was in jeopardy and he was waiting for his punishment.

[Interviewer/Podcast Host]

Hey, just a really quick note to say thank you so much to all of our new subscribers. And if you haven't yet subscribed, why not? It means you're the first to know about brand new episodes of High Performance. And it also means we can attract incredible new guests to the show. So please hit subscribe right now. Enjoy the show.

Andy, welcome to the show.

[Andy Wilman]

Coffee in my mouth. Thank you. Thanks for having me on.

Through me.

[Interviewer/Podcast Host]

I love your book, Mr. Willman's Motoring Adventures. One of the things that comes through in the book is that without the brain and the drive and the occasional madness of Jeremy Clarkson, very little of what you've been involved in would have happened.

[Andy Wilman]

No, we wouldn't be here. That book would be a cover and then there'd be some blank pages because the start of it or the root of it is that what people see is this big TV presenter and now inbound for national treasure, the way the farm is going sort of thing. Something you never thought would happen. But he's actually. And you cut him in open. He's a tabloid daily newspaper journalist. That's where he was trained. That's what he loves the most. And that you're only good at that if you're driven by stories and your ability to spot them and come up with them. And that's what he is. So you've got a combination of his story like machine in his head is fantastic. Then he's got that ability to be bold. So when we had to bring back Top Gear, you know, it goes off. It's been on still not on the BBC 1999, 2000. Jane Root Controller, BBC2, takes the old pebble mill Top Gear off air because she's saying at this point as a factual entertainment show or whatever they call them, consumer thing it's looking old, you know, you've got Trini and Susanna, what not to wear. You've got changing rooms, you've got Jamie Oliver with his little scooter. And next to that, you've got Top Gear looking old. You've got the presenters just saying 5 minute things in solitary confinement and then you go to the next one. So she goes, that comes off air. He rang me shortly after. She said that, that it doesn't come back until she's got a good proposition on the table. He says, come to the pub. I come to the pub and I swear, you know, these scribbly bits of paper everywhere. He had about 70% of what top Gear was gonna become already worked out.

[Interviewer/Podcast Host]

What was on those bits of paper.

[Andy Wilman]

Then he'd worked out that it should happen in a place and he'd worked out it should be somewhere, not a studio, like a hangar. He was like, we don't make it. If we go into a studio, it's le or it's something like that. So we make it a home. It's a base.

[Interviewer/Podcast Host]

Yeah.

[Andy Wilman]

It's where Top Gear lives when the lights are off, sort of thing. So a hangar made sense. Cause then we could be on an airfield and then we could build a track. And he was like, and if we have the track, we can. Two things. All those sort of tests of fast cars that you've been doing on Top Gear in the past, they're all done right round in the Midlands. So he's like, you're in a Ferrari, a Lamborghini, going, this car's amazing. And it's like 58 miles an hour because it's all you can do. And he's like, if we've got a Runway and we gotta make a bit of a track, we can really open them up properly, show the full speeds and anyway, and we can use the track for entertainment as well. We'll get guests in, we'll have a chat with them about the car history, but they've got to do a lap and set a lap time. And what he was doing is magpying him from different places. So we'll set laps of the fancy cars that we test. We'll have a lap board for that and we'll have a lap board for guests and lap times. And we'd both read Nick Hornby, High Fidelity. And if you read that, that sort of male. The male brain in that book of those guys who nerd away in that record shop, they always, whenever they start to talk about something, they go, top five. Yeah. Top five. And it's a, it is a male thing. I think lists, because lists are so pointless in anybody else's world. But we like, we're drawn to doing them. So he knew that would press that button. And then the other thing that was the two things that were quite revolutionary in terms of the presenting of cars was he said, we don't test a car until it's on sale in this country in right hand drive so that somebody can watch it on the show and then go down the showroom. And at the time Top Gear would do what the magazines do, like autocar. And everybody was like, if Ferrari launched a left hand drive Ferrari in Italy. But it's a year from coming to Britain. Everybody still goes over and films and writes about it. Yeah. Even though it's not going to be here for a year and it's in left hand drive and it's on Italian roads. And he's like, why are we doing that? And I crap myself. Cause as a producer you're going, no, we can get scoops, we can get exclusives. All those words. And he went, no, we wait, we wait. Why we let everyone else go first. Cause he'd again worked out that he said we've gotta pull ourselves out of that arms race of car magazines where they chase the exclusive. Cause they're doing it for a niche audience of nerds who want to read it first. And he's like, we gotta accept we're not, that we don't do that now. We wait for our TV audience who's gonna be broader and we go for them. So we had to wait two years before we drove it for Arienzo. And you'd watch everyone else talking about it, doing it. And we'd wait and we'd wait. And he was right. It didn't make any difference. And then the other thing he did was same logic. He said we're gonna do a news section in the middle. And he had a purpose for it. It became a about as the show got bigger. But the first purpose was if you've got a car like the new Golf or the new Ford Escort, they're very important cars because they sell a lot. But his argument is because he'd shot enough cars, they don't make telly. What can you say about a new Golf? It's going to be fine. There's no point in devoting 6, 7 minutes of film to it. So he goes, so what we'll do is we'll go new Golf on sale. We've driven it, it's great. It costs this. You can have it in these three engine specs next. And then he said, and then we'll save our films for more interesting cars. Go to Yetis or whatever, you know, that don't sell so well, but you can make telly from them. So he's doing all these things and I'm sitting in the pub going, jesus. And like. And what about the celebs who won't do a lap? And he went, well, they don't come on the show. And I'm like, no, no, no, no, no, we've got a bend. And he's like, well, no, we never give. And. And he's like, celebs are twats. And I'm like. And I'm thinking, well, you are one. So, you know, so I can't argue with this fact. But he was right.

[Interviewer/Podcast Host]

But I love the idea that he has the kind of courage of his own convictions. Cause that's like a lot of visionary stuff. And it actually, for people who are listening to this now, who might be 20, 30 years younger than us, they probably hear this and go, well, that's quite ordinary. It was not quite ordinary in 2000. No, it was not happening. 25 years.

[Andy Wilman]

The vase up and you smash it against the wall. So that's the old show.

[Interviewer/Podcast Host]

Yeah.

[Andy Wilman]

And then everyone goes, what have you just done? And he goes, well, that's not going back together, is it? So he, like, he removes the option by smashing it and you can only go forward, but. So he had enough thoughts down on paper to get us over the line to get Jane Root to go, right, go do it. But what we didn't have at the time.

The goal was still refresh the Top Gear of Pebble Mill. So we weren't thinking about Minis going down ski jumps or Reliant robbing space shuttles or building amphibious cars or Granny's doing donuts or all that sort of stuff. That wasn't in any of the plans. The relationship between the three, we had no expectation. It was just three people who got on together, all right, but that they would become literally like, people thought they were Morcom and Wise living together, you know, there was no plan for that. That was all organic development.

[Interviewer/Podcast Host]

When you watch, like, let's say, show number three or four, that you put together with Jeremy and with Richard and with James, are you proud of those shows now or do you look and go, man, there was no relationship between them. And it wasn't crazy, it wasn't fun.

[Andy Wilman]

Well, that first series was like, I forbade the BBC, when I had the power to do it, to not show series one, you know, because it put them on repeat, I was like, no, that one goes into, like a vault. Is that true? Yeah. I was like. Cause it's so.

[Interviewer/Podcast Host]

Can you see it anywhere?

[Andy Wilman]

Couldn't see it anywhere now. Now as soon as it all went tits and we were all shown the door, they start punting it out. But it was so crap compared to what we. I mean, we didn't have James in series one. We had Jason Dore doing the Newscaster. I remember now. Yeah, yeah, Jason was good. And that was a hangover of us going, people need consumer news. And we'll give him that. Cause we help people save a few quid. But once again, organically, as we start to go, hey, can a granny do a donut? Hey, can a nun jump a monster truck? And, like, these are little fill in things that we're doing to amuse ourselves. And the Stig starts to become a character that kids are, like, loving. You start to realize quite quickly that there's no point in us talking about used deals on citrons. You know, deals on used citrons. We'll leave that to someone else. So we kind of part company with Jason and then go back and get James, who we hadn't been allowed to have. Why not? Because Jane Root said, when we cast this new show, it's new faces apart from Jeremy. So we do huge. So with 2001. So it's like new faces apart from Jeremy. So that means people like Tiffany Dell, who's brilliant, can't be on it because he's an older face. So we start casting around. We do open auditions. Never ever. Never ever. We got hundreds and hundreds of VHS's coming in to the office. 90% of them are people doing donuts around B and Q car parks. And they're like, this is my audition. And you're like, yeah, keep doing that. Sorry, bnq. And then one day, the girl who was in charge of the, like, looking at all the tapes, Kate, she went, have you got a minute? Come and have a look at this one. Come look at this one that's come in. So she slots it in the old VHS machine. She went, what he's doing is a bit shit, I do not know. But. And we looked at it and there was a man and he was in a sort of party shop, Batman outfit, standing on a wall. And he was. The car that he was gonna talk about was below him. Then he said some Batman type things jumps off the wall and Lands next to the car and then starts talking about the car. And none of it had any. You know, the Batman thing had nothing. It could have been a Fiesta. It made no sense what he was doing. And I said to Kate, what is he doing? She went, fuck nose. And we were like, yeah, we haven't got a clue. But there was something about him and his energy. So we were like, we all agree we like him. So we said, right, let's put him on the audition list. And she's like, richard Hammond. Right, okay, I'll get him in.

[Interviewer/Podcast Host]

That was Richard Hammond.

[Andy Wilman]

That was Richard Hammond. I think he was on Men and Motors at the time.

[Interviewer/Podcast Host]

Why was he dressed up in a Batman outfit?

[Andy Wilman]

He's on Men and Motors and Men and Motors didn't have a lot of budget. They were a really punky car show and they did the best with what they had and they had a laugh, they had a really great spirit, but they didn't have a lot of money and I think everyone was left to do what they wanted. So if you're still finding a fee, if he went, oh, I'm gonna go and get a Batman outfit, they'll go, yeah, gone. There was no like, why? So. But he was clearly good. So we did the auditions in West London in this TV sort of studio. And the auditions were audition. He comes in, talks about a car. It was a Renault Aventime, so weird car. Say some words about that. Then do the mock news section with Jeremy, go through a few press releases, see how you get on with him. Everyone comes through, does their bit. We get to Jeremy and Richard. Richard does his audition and it's only okay. It's not great. And we're like, oh, this was our big hope.

[Interviewer/Podcast Host]

Oh, no, I was only okay.

[Andy Wilman]

It was just okay. So come to the end of the audition and we're all shuffling our papers going, oh, that wasn't what we hoped for. And then Richard just went, I fucked this up, haven't I? And we were like, no, no, no. Full British politeness. Not at all, no, no, not at all, no. Good God, no. No. He went, no, I have. I fucked it up. Same as I fuck everything up. Then starts this monologue about things he's fucked up in his past career moves. And it gets funnier and funnier because the self deprecation and the way he paints the pictures and it climaxes him with him going, and then I tried to be a radio DJ and the peak of my career was Radio Cumbria, the nighttime slot. So, you know, full Alan Partridge through till dawn. And he gone. And the peak of the show was me reading out 25 minute long list the names of lambs up for adoption. Right. And that's the peak of his radio career. So by this point, Jeremy's in like tears. Cause of the delivery of Richard. Just like onslaught of failure. And he's doing his audition again by talking about how much he screwed up. And we were everywhere. Porter, all of us were in bits.

[Interviewer/Podcast Host]

That's Richard Porter, the writer, Richard Porter.

[Andy Wilman]

Yeah. And we were laughing and laughing so much. And then it was like, okay, forget what he did. He's a keeper. We have to have him.

[Interviewer/Podcast Host]

And what I like about that is, particularly now we're in this world of perfection. Everything on social media is perfect. People come onto this podcast, right?

[Andy Wilman]

Yeah.

[Interviewer/Podcast Host]

And they like to say, well, we had a plan and we knew what we were gonna do and we carried out the plan. And that's why I'm successful. And what I love about this is that Richard Hammond has basically gone, well, I'm shit at stuff.

[Andy Wilman]

I'm shit at stuff.

[Interviewer/Podcast Host]

That's why you hired him. And you're also like, I know that Jeremy had that plan in the pub that day, but it almost feels to me like that was kind of. That was the framework. But everything that's in it. You kind of. I don't want to be rude. And I want you to take this in the right way. It feels to me like you're stumbling into the success. That Top Cuban.

[Andy Wilman]

Yeah, it's fully. That whole book is about accidents. Yeah, accidents all the way. Cause you get these huge shows like we're watching Traitors. You watch Celebrity Love island. All of them, they're tested to death before they go on air. The Apprentice. And they come out of the traps and they're pretty much brilliant from the get go. Cause they know what they want to achieve and they know they can format them around the world. And we didn't. We just went, oh, we've got our three million. And Jane Root will now leave us alone. Series two.

[Interviewer/Podcast Host]

So that's the BBC saying, get three million and we're happy. Yeah.

[Andy Wilman]

And then. And then they left us alone. Cause who's interested in cars at the BBC on the top floor? Nobody. So they leave us to it. It's like tick. That works. So then left to our own devices, we start to piss about, like, what can we do? Jim Wiseman. Do you know Jim?

[Interviewer/Podcast Host]

I know Jim well, yeah.

[Andy Wilman]

Yeah. So Jim is like sitting there and Jim's brain goes that direction. Like when everyone else goes in that direction, but it goes in the same direction as Jeremy's. Like, he just flips everything. Jim, one morning, he goes, you know, you're always getting like, Evel Knievel, like, how many buses can a bike jump? He went, no one's asked how many bikes a bus can jump, right? And you know, straight away, that is a Fast show sketch in the making because the punchline is already there. And we love that fast show idea of the punchline. Unlucky. Alf is going to fall down a hole. When we build it up and build it up, this bus is coming towards this row of 30 bikes. And, you know, and you're doing all the crap like, oh, I'll probably clear 15 of them. You know, I'm helping for 18. And when it comes up this ramp, you just know it just lands on all of them.

So Jim was bringing that kind of vibe, and he was dovetailing with Jeremy really quickly.

[Interviewer/Podcast Host]

And he's a producer, Jim.

[Andy Wilman]

Yeah, yeah. And I came in one morning, he was talking to this woman and she was getting really angry. And he'd watched a documentary about a bloke living with a bear in Canada. They always have those on, you know, bears in the kitchen doing cornflakes and that. And he's going, well, what if we got it on automatic? And you can hear this woman getting angrier and angrier. And then he went, all right, what about a monkey? And then, like, she just gets angry and angry. And he put his phone down. I was like, who was that? And he went, it was a zoo. And I was just trying to see if we could get a bear to drive. And I was like. So it didn't go well, did it? It went no worse than that. You're getting a call from the police. So it's like. And then James. And then Jimigo. Okay, next.

Like, we do these shoots, the road trips, and I'm in the edit and I'm getting all the pieces to camera that James has said and Richard said and Jeremy said. And they hit the things they got, the points they got, they want to make. And half of James's were like, oh, look at that church over there. That is. And it is a lovely church, isn't it? You're like, what the fuck's that gotta do with what we're doing? But he.

[Interviewer/Podcast Host]

They became everything.

[Andy Wilman]

He forgets. He's actually on a film trip.

[Interviewer/Podcast Host]

He's actually on a holiday producer going mention something mundane because people love it.

[Andy Wilman]

No, that is you. You could not make them do it. Yeah. Now, once A traitor arrives. They probably hamper, ramp it up a bit. You know, Jeremy does become more bombastic and Richard does become a bit more Norman wisdom. You know, like he's. He will. He will act thick, so to speak, when he just reduces everything. And James probably will act a bit more like bumbly, bumbly old professor. Yeah. That he'll take forever to do whatever he's got to do. So when you're doing those, you know the bits in the film where they all meet and greet with their cars. I bought this. I bought this. And then they'll have a pop at each other's choices and you can just, before you're about to shoot that, you can see Jeremy in his car and he's going. Because he's a writer and he doesn't leave anything to chance. He's. He can free flow, but he wants his hit points, he wants them down. He knows what he's gonna say. And James is kind of similar. And Hammond's on his phone, vaping, looking at whatever, talking to Mindy, whatever. And I'm like. We are filming in like 10 minutes, you know, he's going, yeah, yeah, fuck off. I know that, I know that. And then phone off. Right, Richard. And he gets out the car and then these one liners fire in and he just. Like the Borg in Star Trek, he just absorbs what's going on and then delivers his contribution. And his contribution is to slot in in a certain way, which is to knock their feet from under them.

[Interviewer/Podcast Host]

So I find this so fascinating.

[Andy Wilman]

But that is. You cannot. I'm so lucky, because we never ever planned or taught that. That's just what they knew what to do, you know.

[Interviewer/Podcast Host]

And you think it is luck.

[Andy Wilman]

Well, those three came together. Yeah. It was lightning in a bottle.

[Interviewer/Podcast Host]

Absolutely lightning in a bottle.

[Andy Wilman]

The choosing of each other, the recruiting. Yeah, we consciously did it, but the level it got to, we never saw that coming. So I think they're similar intelligence levels, they're similar attitude to cars, that they're all a bit lateral minded. All works. The similar levels of mischief. That all works. But a key component was this thing about the BBC leaving us alone, because, as you know, with TV or any show these days, the demand is that the hosts come on air. Perfect. They've got a relationship already. Like, where's that from?

[Interviewer/Podcast Host]

Yeah.

[Andy Wilman]

And viewers can spot it when it's like a TV relationship. And we were allowed quite a few series for that to just develop. I don't think it was till. Bloody hell, Series five until Richard calls James Captain Slow. You know, he just says it one day in the news and then that becomes his nickname. But five series.

[Interviewer/Podcast Host]

Yeah, and that's the problem. It takes time to develop these relationships and I think, yeah, it was a hospital pass for whoever came next because it was like, be as funny and as interesting and as well connected as the previous three, please.

[Andy Wilman]

When? Worse than that.

[Interviewer/Podcast Host]

On day one.

[Andy Wilman]

Yeah. And worse than that, I think you had some BBC management going, I've got what this show is. It's three lads mucking about. Well, yes, so is League of the.

[Interviewer/Podcast Host]

Road, but it feels like the easiest thing to produce in the world. People just having fun together. I think it's one of the most difficult.

[Andy Wilman]

No, it's shot through with nuance. Everywhere there's nuance. And the big one about Jeremy, in terms of that editorial brain, in terms of nuance, was.

You could watch our show, describe it down the phone to another TV company in another country, go, oh, well, they build crazy cars and then there's everything goes wrong and they go, right, got that. They could build a clown car where everything falls off. But what you're doing is just building an aircraft carrier for jokes. It's pointless. Whereas Jeremy was the one and he indoctrinated everybody with it and instilled it was, we are going to piss about, we are going to about everything will go wrong, but we have to start with a premise that you can hook in. So Ambulances, probably one of our best films, where they build their own ambulances, you can stand, look the viewers in the eye and go, do you realize a new ambulance costs this much? Do you realize how slow they are? The NHS hasn't got any money, we can solve this for them. So you've got that fantastic overreaching hubris which you know is going to be your downfall, but. But it's actually grounded in a premise that people can go, oh yeah, wouldn't it be great if we could have new ambulances or cheaper police cars or that you can bash and crash. So they always picked on a point that would then drive your nonsense. Then you could unleash all the slapstick and the falling over and everything else, but it was always grounded in a why I've built my ambulance to be like so and so and without that you're screwed.

[Interviewer/Podcast Host]

And of course the wonderful thing about that as well is, although it's not necessarily a format in the traditional TV sense of a format, those are your format points. Because every time it's like we set it up, we over promise, we under deliver.

[Andy Wilman]

Yeah, those Are we get things wrong?

[Interviewer/Podcast Host]

And then you can swap an ambulance for a caravan for a supercar for a boat stroke car. An amphibious car.

[Andy Wilman]

Yeah, we'll build an amphibious car. We'll build police cars.

[Interviewer/Podcast Host]

Rinse and repeat.

[Andy Wilman]

Rinse and repeat, as you say. We got into sort of. I'd come with weapons in our armory. So another one was discovering that cheap cars that break down make better TV than new cars. We hadn't gone into the new Top Gear thinking that. But then when you go. One day, we did that film about, can you own a Porsche for 1500 quid? Now, it starts in the office as like, slightly consumer advice. People like Porsches, but they cost a lot. Can you do it? 1500 quid. So we go off expecting to do a kind of. It'd be a bit funny, but it's like, hey, you can own a. So they set off from the city of London and they're trying to get to Brighton for challenge number one. 1500 quid Porsches. Jeremy's got like a 928. I mean, it's doomed at that price. And they've got to get 70 miles to Brighton or whatever. They leave the city, 8 miles. Have got to a petrol station in Elephant and Castle. All three cars are broken down, steam pissing out the radiators, people coming out, a lorry driver coming out going, I've got an egg. Put that in a radiator.

[Interviewer/Podcast Host]

I loved when members of the public became of your show.

[Andy Wilman]

Everyone's in.

[Interviewer/Podcast Host]

Do you remember when. Well, you, of course, you were like. Hundreds of people would turn up. No, I know.

[Andy Wilman]

Like, we built the electric car and all the kids are helping us recharge it.

[Interviewer/Podcast Host]

I just watched that. I thought, that's where I want to get to tv.

[Andy Wilman]

And it's like. And that was a key moment. Cause I remember the director, who was old school, very good director, but he was old school and there's all this chaos. Cars, steam everywhere. And he fatal mistake, he went up to Jeremy and he went, shall I break the cruise for lunch while you get all these mended? Right. And Jeremy went, no, this. This is the film now. This is the film. Cars running and working is not the film anymore. It's the chaos. Yeah. So we flipped and again, an accidental discovery. We found that then shonky cars are going to give you the loads.

[Interviewer/Podcast Host]

An accidental discovery. But every other TV show, because I was working in telly at that time when things went wrong, the. The director broke the crew. Yes, it's accidental, but it's Jeremy going, let's look at this a totally different.

[Andy Wilman]

Way to everywhere we do this.

[Interviewer/Podcast Host]

That's the maverick thinking that that's right.

[Andy Wilman]

And then when we accidentally discover we can do specials when we go to Alabama and get our asses kicked there, but it's all good and the film becomes an hour. So we haven't planned a special, we just shot a normal film that's too long and we go, oh, we can do specials. We then go, let's use that thing of cheap old cars that have had their day and we put them through across Africa or whatever, and then they become underdog heroes. And if you don't like cars, you can still fall in love with that car. And the three of them have the ability to make those cars live. And in part that somebody didn't really like cars. So you got Rocky Balboa going on, basically. So all these happy accidents start to go. You realize when our show starts to take off, you've got to protect it from the BBC. Not in a horrible way, but once it started getting noticed and getting bigger and all the rest of it, everyone starts coming in going, would you do this? Would you do that?

[Interviewer/Podcast Host]

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[Andy Wilman]

Hannah Berner Are those the cozy Tommy John pajamas you're buying? Paige de Sorbo they are Tommy John and yes, I'm stocking up because they make the best holiday gifts. So generous. Well, I'm a generous girly, especially when it comes to me. So I'm grabbing the softest sleepwear, comfiest underwear and best fitting loungewear. So nothing for your bestie? Of course I'm getting my dad, Tommy John and you.

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[Andy Wilman]

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[Interviewer/Podcast Host]

Was it because they wanted some of the credit for the success or because they realized that, hey, there's plenty of.

[Andy Wilman]

People, all the top gear on the CVs that had nothing to do with it, but that is the same as every show. We'd just like giggle at that.

[Interviewer/Podcast Host]

Success has many fathers. Right? Failure's an orphan.

[Andy Wilman]

Failure is an orphan. Yeah. So we, we knew that. We let that one go because as long as it doesn't materially interfere with us.

[Interviewer/Podcast Host]

What sort of things were the BBC doing that would just create an issue in this great process?

[Andy Wilman]

Well, they weren't issues, but they were like, they needed. They needed a firm. No, because a lot of the time they were like W1Amoments, as in, they were quite charmingly crap. So one day, I think we're about four or five series in, we're doing well, and I get a call from the two management people top floor and go see them, I don't know why. And they go, we have got some amazing news for you. They went, BBC2 historically fails to attract young black and Asian viewers. It's just not a channel they want to go to. However your show's doing it, your show's pulling in young black and Asian viewers. I was like, great, this is good news. And it was a silence. And I went, right, I'll get back and I'll tell the office and I'll let everyone know. Thanks, thanks for letting us know. And they were like, don't go. And you thought, oh, no, here it comes. Right, with the W1Amoment. And by W1A, if nobody's watched that, it's the comedy show where the BBC takes a mick out of its own ability to overthink and tie itself in knots. It is a great show.

[Interviewer/Podcast Host]

Yeah.

[Andy Wilman]

So this guy goes, we were just thinking that since young black and Asian viewers are watching the show, have you thought about replacing one of your team with a young black or Asian viewer? And I was like, one of the trio. Yeah. And I'm like, here we are, W18. Cause it's like that blinding logic now, what you do in these circumstances, you go, we'll certainly give that some thought, knowing that they'll never hear, no one will ever mention it again. And I thought, no, fuck it, I can't let this one go. Because I was just, like I said. So hang on a minute. What you're saying is young black and Asian viewers are perfectly happy of their own volition to watch three white, middle class, middle aged men bumbling about doing their stuff. They're happy to do that. But your response now is, no, we'll take that away from you and give you something you haven't asked for. So I was like, isn't that a bit patronizing to these ethnic groups? And as soon as I said patronizing and ethnic in one sentence, it was like, checkmate, BBC panic. I was done. Yeah, well, I say in the book, it's like the BBC meeting life raft suddenly automatically inflates, but they're like the meeting life abandoned, shit emergency. Yeah, but instead of like flares and water, it's got sentences like, good, well, we'll pick this up later. You know, so those kind of moments, you have to. And I think in that culture, some producers would have gone back and gone, right, we've got to consider this because this is what they want. Whereas we would just go, shut up.

[Interviewer/Podcast Host]

So did you take all this pressure on your own shoulders? Because a lot of people listen to high performance in leadership positions, trying to work out to lead a team better. Like, you were working on two very different shows, I think, because when Top Gear first started, no expectations, no fame, no past glory to rely on, it was all about, what could we do? And it gave you freedom.

[Andy Wilman]

Yeah.

[Interviewer/Podcast Host]

Suddenly you actually had, you know, for people that don't understand television, you and I, when I was at the BBC, not now with a podcast, but we lived and died by the overnights. Right, the overnight viewing figures. How many people.

[Andy Wilman]

Yeah.

[Interviewer/Podcast Host]

Watch the show the previous day. So suddenly, not only did you have that, but you had the fact that last week's overnights were nine and a half, 10 million.

[Andy Wilman]

Right.

[Interviewer/Podcast Host]

So that sets the expectation. Everyone's loving it. The BBC are paying more attention. The lads can't walk down the street without being stopped.

[Andy Wilman]

No, that fame was a joke.

[Interviewer/Podcast Host]

How do you then lead a team differently in a very different world?

[Andy Wilman]

I'd like to think we led it differently, but. Okay, I think one thing I did, I borrowed from David Brent because I do believe that's my favorite sentence of.

[Interviewer/Podcast Host]

The conversation so far. My leadership at Top Gear, I borrowed from David Brent.

[Andy Wilman]

David Brent, because I think he's much maligned. We know he's a cockhand and he's created and, like, portrayed as a. But the one bit that I absolutely think he gets right is that we have worked our society into this position where capitalism is what it is, in that we've all got to go out and earn a crust and all the best hours of the. Of your life, all the best hours of the day are spent with people you work with and not your loved ones, your friends, your family. They're not. It's the other way around. And you get them for a bit in the evening and two of the seven days a week. It is what it is. That's why we do it. And I always thought David Brent kind of instinctively knew that. And although he did it for his own ends, he liked to make a bit of theater out of the office. You know, he did a terrible job, but his instinct was like, this place can't be drab. So we did piss about a lot in our office in terms of how much fun it was. And you know, you got people like Jim in there. It's. It's always going to be that way. And we were always tight and it was failure was like celebrated. It meant to hurt and then it was celebrated, you know, so we had a good vibe in that way. But the rest of it, I. I would say we didn't do very well because of when the show took off and you're getting your 9 million and you don't have a format where you can refresh the next series with new contestants. Yeah, it's just us coming up with new, new films. Even though we've got an armory of cheap Cars specials build shit, you know, we've got stuff, things that we can fall back on. You are now under so much pressure.

And of everything has also got so huge. The films that started out as 10 minutes, an hour, half an hour, but you still got the same edit schedule, you still got the same timetable. So we're in that till 2, 3 in the morning editing these things. And we didn't work out how to delegate. We didn't know how to work out to make it a different show. So the pressure becomes nasty and we all. I think we all hunkered together on the pressure. You know, it's like. I think Phil Church would call it like Top Gear fear that you've like got to get it right. You've got to do it and you're doing it for each other at home is absolutely decimates family life, marriage, everything. Because we've got this shot at making this amazing show and making some money and security. And I'm obsessed by that because of my childhood. I'm obsessed with like financial security is the answer to everything.

[Interviewer/Podcast Host]

What do you mean because of your childhood?

[Andy Wilman]

Cause it was tough times for. I know people go, what, you went to a boarding school with Jeremy. But in the book, you'll see what I mean on that. There's a nuance to what I'm saying there, where you grow up with the obsession that financial security solves everything. That really does buy happiness logic. You sort of go, no, I know it isn't true, but you think it is. I do. So it decimates home life. The pressure of, like, delivering same schedule. We don't grow the team enough and we are exhausted. That's all coming together. And then we, in our power, get a bit giddy and we start to get a bit ragged with, like, how we conduct ourselves, how we manage, like, what's the right thing to do and the wrong thing to do? And we starts to screw up at that point.

[Interviewer/Podcast Host]

What sort of stuff?

[Andy Wilman]

So, a good example, Mexico, when we insult the Mexicans, and in the news item now, ironically, the BBC compliance pin, they pass it, they go, that's okay, because for whatever reasons, you can do national stereotypes or whatever. If there's a stereotype that Mexicans love sleeping and not doing much, we're allowed to play with that. But we didn't play with it, we were just nasty with it. We just love the sound of our own bloody voices.

[Interviewer/Podcast Host]

That's the interesting part, isn't it? The nastiness was so unlike Top Gear.

[Andy Wilman]

Yes.

[Interviewer/Podcast Host]

That's what I remember watching that going, yeah, it was.

[Andy Wilman]

Ooh. And we didn't see it. You're right.

[Interviewer/Podcast Host]

You do it in a fun way.

[Andy Wilman]

So when we do lorry drivers murder prostitutes, Daily Mail's going batshit, sure. But everyone else is laughing. Eddie Stobart's ringing up going, I never laugh so much in my life. And we do murder them. And it's like. It's funny, you know, and no one's. Everyone, viewers are going, he made the stupidest joke, which has got a bit of a trope to it. And this wasn't lorry drivers murder prostitutes, or Jeremy going, people in the middle lane on the motorway. We should have snipers on the bridges to shoot them in the middle of the face. You know, that's what I'm doing when I become Prime Minister. People go, that's not really going to happen. So we'll laugh at it. But Mexico was just horrible. And then we get all the death threats piling in from Mexico. And I'll do a little run up how this all starts to come to be death threats. Oh, tons, tons. Yeah. They're all coming into the office. But the BBC go, well, it's okay, you know, it didn't breach any whatevers. So I think a little bit cowardly we go, yeah, well we didn't breach anything, so we're all right, but inside we're actually going nah, this was shit, we were ashamed. Then I get an email from the Mexican embassy about a month later and we'd slagged off the Mexican ambassador as well in that piece because at some point in the news item one of them goes, I bet the Mexican ambassador's watching this and he's going to be on the phone tomorrow. And then one of them goes, no he won't, he'll be asleep. AUDIENCE LAUGHS as it happens, he wasn't asleep and he was watching it, right? So he sends the firm protest over to the BBC demanding an apology for, to the Mexican people. They don't give it because they go, we didn't breach anything. They give a personal apology to him, but not to, to Mexicans. Anyway, they invite, as this email invites all four of us to come down to the embassy to celebrate National Independence Day Mexico. And we're like, well we're gonna get murdered when we go there, but we've gotta go cause this is like James Bond and the going into the baddies lair. So we get our suits on, we go in, me, Jeremy and James, cause Richard's away, film him. The Mexican ambassador is the nicest man on the planet. And he's like guys, when you said I was asleep laughing, I cracked up. He went, I actually did die laughing. And he said, myself and my press guy, we laughed about it. But then we went right, we've gotta get serious cause actually you've insulted our country. He said, so there's the irony. I got an apology I didn't want or need and my country didn't get one. And that's what it does need. So by this point we're feeling like this tall. Also there's margaritas everywhere and we're not real spirits drinkers but they're delicious. So we're about three in and getting pissed and like that sort of shame is compounded by we've had a few. So Jeremy's like, right, I'm writing my son column this week about it's going to be a full apology to the Mexicans. So we eventually we did it, we did it properly, but it took the Mexican ambassador to sort of right the ship and show us the error of our ways, that it could all be sorted.

[Interviewer/Podcast Host]

And if that hadn't happened, do you think it could have caught your kind of giddiness? Your. The ego's running away with you could have.

[Andy Wilman]

Well, that's my point. That's when I'd then go on to say is like, that was great. That lesson was learned from him. But the lesson we didn't learn was that we have any consequences. Yeah. Because he, like a diplomat, offered a solution, we took it and all was smoothed over and he was nothing but charmed. So you sort of come out of that embassy trashed, going, well, that went well.

But by that point, we are quite high on our own entitlement that we can do anything. So we do that slope joke, which is shit, and get caught for it because there's no permission to do it. We just did it beyond everyone's back.

[Interviewer/Podcast Host]

All right, you hadn't.

[Andy Wilman]

You.

[Interviewer/Podcast Host]

Had you not shared that with the lawyers and people?

[Andy Wilman]

No, because you'll remember this, the PVC works on that referral system whereby your. It's your program. The onus is on the program to go, is this okay to transmit? And we were like, well, they won't. They won't like that. But it's a little silly Vietnam War film, Commando mag, silly reference. It's not a big deal, so we'll do it. And then I went. And nobody will notice anyway. Which they didn't, except some old hack in the Daily Style did notice it. Then it all unravels. And at that point, we are in a world of. There's a management layer in the BBC that. So the ones that we'd annoyed the editorial policy people were, like, livid because they had been so helpful all through the years and they'd let us go with things like lorry drivers and prostitutes and all that. They gave us fantastic leeway because all those things were always defensible.

So they're like, why did you lie to us? Why did you pull the wool over? Why did you do that when we've done nothing but be helpful for you? And we were like. We just felt like absolutely like. Because we had gone like kids who had gone too far, you know, and.

We did our apologizing. But then by that point, there's a section of BBC management that absolutely doesn't like us. Whereas the editorial lot are like, we'll get through this, we'll kiss and make up, but, hell, yeah, not again. Yeah, yeah. And then there's an element that doesn't like us. And then we're basically. Battle lines are drawn, you know, to the end.

[Interviewer/Podcast Host]

And what would Jeremy, James and Richard like in. In this kind of atmosphere?

[Andy Wilman]

The office is very much. They come in to do meetings and record stuff and then films. I'm in there all the time, like dealing with management coming in and out and what they want to do. Jeremy wants to know. Yeah, so he's like ear to the ground about everything. Richard probably a bit more as well. So we do feel a bit of like, they feel untouchable, though, at this point. Yeah, I think we do. The show was so tight and we were so popular and the good times were so good. And because we were like in our own little bubble in, out, you know, not in the BBC. I think the office, they didn't feel fearful of any of it, but they were just like, here we go again, you know, we're on our roller coaster ride and they like being part of our, you know, this gang that is a. It's a show that does well and it's a proud one to be on. And you see V looks good when you're on it and it's lively as hell, the whole thing, you know, we.

[Interviewer/Podcast Host]

Used to talk about it all the time when I was working at the BBC, both on kids, telly and Formula.

[Andy Wilman]

Oh, really?

[Interviewer/Podcast Host]

Well, because you weren't at television center, you were in your own porter cabin somewhere else.

[Andy Wilman]

That one. Yeah.

[Interviewer/Podcast Host]

There was all these rumors, like, you can't get there, they won't let you in to watch the show. It's like they run by their own rules. And we were like, oh, well, that's how we want to be.

[Andy Wilman]

There was that. And I think we also made the place a bit. I mean, it was a pigsty. And I remember, like, we had this great press officer, Tara, and she used to. She'd be in the press office and she'd write, I'll go down and see Top Gear now. And she said a couple of time, people go, how can you work with that lot? And she went, because they're really funny and they're actually really charming and they're actually really nice. And they're like, no, that can't be true. Because there was this perception that it was like Animal House, you know, and that we were like misogynistic dicks or something like that. And she went, it couldn't be further from the truth. It's actually just like some blokes and there's a lot of girls who work there and this tiny turnover. Yeah. Runners had become producers. So it's not one of those shitty, toxic environments, it's just a bit chaotic.

[Interviewer/Podcast Host]

But it did challenge your mental health. Right.

[Andy Wilman]

You.

[Interviewer/Podcast Host]

You talk about in the book that you were on antidepressants by the end of your.

[Andy Wilman]

Oh, God, yeah. And it was a classic. Me or anybody actually on that show at that high up, you take the antidepressants, but not the warning that came with it. I didn't think burnout. I didn't allow the thought that burnout could exist. But the hours we were doing were two or three in the morning in the edit, and that was four nights a week. Then the weekend, you're going through the film that is going to go out on air on Wednesday, on Sunday, and you're doing it all again. And then like I say that thing at the back of your mind, like, that film's not as good as the last one. And how are we going to keep 8 million viewers? Whereas most shows, I think, when we've had a good run of 8 million are going, look, it's okay to slip down to 6. It happens. It's fine. We could not entertain it and we couldn't enjoy any of it.

I think because we were so insecure.

And because.

It had grown so organically suddenly. It was so much part of us. Yeah, but the insecurity was a huge one, was that we couldn't let that go. Because then I think we'd go, right, what are we left with? We're left with ourselves. And that's not a very nice thing because we're probably not very nice people. We're just a bit useless, you know, that's what we thought, our insecurity. The knock on of that was that we took hold of the show. And what I mean by that is we didn't take hold of it like in terms of contracts and ip, we took hold of it in terms of everyone else at the BBC. Stay away, leave us to make this. And once your insecurity makes you do that, because we're like, this is gonna define us and we're gonna do it. Once we start to see how good it is, that is then a hamster's wheel, a huge one that you've created. And insecurity drives that because you don't want to. Then having set yourselves up as everyone, stay away while we make this. You don't want to. You don't want to screw up. And then the other thing, I don't know how you feel about this in tv, but not everyone's a jack of all trades. And I've got particular skills. Like I say, I'm really good in an edit, I can run a team, but I'm not a great light bulb moment guy. That's Jeremy. So I'm always like, Worried that I would be found out if I don't do what I'm doing, that people go, well, when's that next? You know, they go, you created Top Gear. I go, no, I didn't. I actually didn't. I helped make it.

[Interviewer/Podcast Host]

I want to talk about a few really significant Top Gear moments. I think television is very interesting because I think it sometimes insulates you from realizing that what you're doing is actually potentially very dangerous, because if there's cameras there, it all must be fine. And I know that the Richard Hammond's sort of rocket car crash generated a lot of headlines because he was seriously injured, but actually, I think when he crashed, the rimac, for you, is the worst, was worse.

[Andy Wilman]

That gave me the hot neck still, because I think, yeah, obviously at the time when he crashes the jet car and he's upside down and the. And then you're in the hospital in Leeds and they go, if his brain swells, then it will kill him. But they go, so there's nothing we can do. And you're like, so we wait. We wait. Now that you're literally ripping your own skin off, you've got demons. That's horrible.

But then I think by the morning, they said, no, he will live. We don't know what he's gonna be like, but he will live. So you drop down a notch. At least he's gonna live. This isn't no orphans, a widow or anything like that.

And then, because it was those times, the Richard recovery and the Richard, it's all about getting Richard back on air. And it's like a big hero story in a movie. He's back. It's Rocky, you know, that was the Times, and the crash was Titanic and massive, and it sort of had a movie thing to it where poor old Freddy's crush was horrible and just debilitating and nasty and so much more sort of tragic in that way. A poor bugger, that one. Horrible. But the rimac one was. The fate element is what gives me the shivers. Because he rolls down that hill, 300 nod feet.

Down that hill, and he comes to rest on the roof and he's in a supercar with, you know, windows like that.

He knows he's busted his knee, he's conscious and he smells. He's like, I'll wait until somebody gets me. Because he's very calm, brain works brilliantly. I'll wait until someone gets me out. Why should I try? Then he smells the burning and goes, I can't wait. And he's got to kick that window in and climb out upside down in a supercar. And the claustrophobia there of that. But what keeps coming back to my head is if he'd been unconscious, nobody would have got to him because there were lots of. It's Switzerland, there's loads of fire and ambulance stuff around. But he'd gone and rolled down the hill away from everybody. And it's that. It's that, like, fuck, what if he'd been unconscious? Yeah. And I think we don't stop doing the show, but same as we don't stop doing the show when we come back from Argentina, you know. But after a while, you start to put them in your little book and go, right, how many lives have we got left?

James is crashing Norway. You're like, okay, that's another one.

And we didn't expect that one. So how many of these have we got left? And as we're aging.

And our brain is also now switched from.

With Top Gear, it's how long can we keep it going or how high can we go? I guess once we get into the autumn of the Grand Tour, is when do we end? Yeah, we have to pick the right moment to end because we have to end on our own terms. That becomes the most important driving factor. We can't keep going out there like status quo, another retirement tour. You know, we've got to stop. So that becomes a driving force. And these crashes start to.

Have a bigger resonance now about. We're pushing it.

[Interviewer/Podcast Host]

And in that situation, as well as the exec, as the most senior person, there's a real personal responsibility mindset, I guess, for you as well.

[Andy Wilman]

Right.

[Interviewer/Podcast Host]

When Richard Hammond is upside down in a burning supercar.

[Andy Wilman]

I'd like to say yes, but.

With such a group, it isn't. I don't sit there going, I know it's going to be me in court with a suit on. But I didn't think of it like that. I think the safety's so good, the office is so good. I do let. I have learned to delegate about that kind of thing. So you're going out with the best stuff. Whereas Jet Crash. I did have those thoughts. It was on me, you know, in my head. I am the one who's gonna have killed him. How can I live with myself anymore? You know, it was like that. Whereas the other one, we were such a machine about health and safety and everything else. By the time we get to Rimac, you've absorbed it.

[Interviewer/Podcast Host]

Yeah. Before we talk about the way that it did end on Top Gear, what do you look back on as the greatest film that you ever made.

[Andy Wilman]

And why can I have two?

Well, there were two specials. One was Burma and one was the Middle East. It wasn't what we did so much. It was. I remember that period, it was like 2000 and whatever. 8, 9, 10. The world, for a moment, was a nicer place. We could go and get permission to film in Burma, in the deepest, darkest parts of Burma. And now it's another friggin civil war there. It's all closed again with three wise men. We land in Iraq, we go through Syria. We're in towns like Aleppo. The people are calling us in, giving us like drinks and sweets and food. And you got guys running around going, captain, slowly. And all that sort of stuff. And they adore those three.

And there's Palmyra over there. And then fast forward and ISIS have annihilated the place. We drive through Damascus and you go, top 10 great cities of the world. So for a moment, the world is an amazing place. The films were good, but what I took back was the whole like, how lucky are we that we're going to these places and work in them? And you felt there was hope for a while that the world was actually going to go that way. That we were going down to embassies and getting permits. Syria, yes. Iraq, yes. Burma, yes.

I remember we were in Burma one night and there was they. They always give you like a government official and they always pretend the government official is there to make sure your hotels are all in order, but they're there to spy on you. And we had some young fixers who were government, and then this older guy, the classic older guy, who was like real pensionable age and of an evening, we'd all sit in wherever we were and he'd sit with his whiskey, knocking it back. And then one evening he was like drunk and he laid into all of us. He just started about how we were taking the piss in his country, how we did what we liked. We had no respect for anybody. None of it was true. Yeah. Cause we were very careful about that. But he just laid in and laid in. And I was like, with the producer going, shit, if this guy reports us back to head office with these thoughts which aren't true, we're going home. And the younger fixer had heard it all. And he went, I've already rung the office. And they said, put him on a bus home tomorrow. It was like the younger guys, they were like, we're not doing that anymore. Yeah, yeah, that old guard who can just.

[Interviewer/Podcast Host]

So interesting.

[Andy Wilman]

Yeah.

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[Interviewer/Podcast Host]

Can I give you a few things that I loved about the show?

[Andy Wilman]

Yeah, go on.

[Interviewer/Podcast Host]

As a TV person.

The Stig. Purely because it's so. In some ways it's nothing. In other ways it's everything.

[Andy Wilman]

Yeah.

[Interviewer/Podcast Host]

How did you even create that character?

[Andy Wilman]

So we needed, like, back to 2001. We're putting the show together and we're trying to work out how the show will operate on air. We've got an hour. We know we need, like, we've got a Richard, we've got Jason Dore used Carl, everyone's got skills. We don't know what Rich's is yet, but we know we're having him. We've got Jason Doyu's car, we've got Jeremy doing road tests and stuff. So Rich can do that. But we need a racing driver because that's what Top Gear had with Tiff Niddell. He could race and talk. Very rare combo for racing drivers. Okay. They can kill me, but I think we're right on that one. And it was apart from Martin Brundle, who's the ging. Yeah. So we're like, okay. And Sebastian Vette. All right. So we're like, they can like, we need that guy.

And I got into a sort of complete frenzy because I was like, okay, we've got an hour and we've got all these things like the news and the guest. And if you do a film, Jeremy and if Jason. Jason daughters a film, Richard does one. We haven't got room for a fourth film. But the Tiffany Dell character's gotta do a film and we need him because we've gotta do the lap stuff on the tracks, you know, the powerful cars on the track. And then I sort of like threw my pen down. I went, not that we can find a fucking racing driver who speaks anyway. Like, what are we doing? And then Jeremy went.

Hang on, why does he need to speak? I was like, what do you mean? And then he went, okay, look. He went, look, I can do the slidey, you know, car going around the corner, smoky tires. He went, tiff taught me to do that. I can slide a car. What I can't do is lap times. I don't know. He said, I can't hit the same apex lap after lap after lap or shave tenths off a car. I can't do it. But I can do all the slidy theatrical telly. So he went to, how do we have it? Like, we'll. We'll test a Ferrari or whatever. I do the slidy shit. And then we just have the racing driver. He's got one job, and it's to set the lap time. And then he doesn't speak. And then he went again. His light bulb. He went, well, even. Whoa, Even better. We make it so that he never speaks and we don't know who he is. He's like, you know, we cover him up. People then start to guess who this guy is, and we give him a name, and people started to guess. So I was like, what should we call him? And he was like, I was watching Pulp Fiction the other night. We'll call him the Gimp, right? And that'll be him. So we hire Perry McCarthy, who's a good.

[Interviewer/Podcast Host]

Do you say, we want to hire you as a gimp.

[Andy Wilman]

Well, this is it. So Perry comes in. I'm like, that's just suit. That's what you're going to look like. And then you lap the cars, you never speak. We never take your helmet off, and then you're a character. So you got a name, and you're going to be called a gimp. And. And Perry goes, and you can go fuck yourself. And we were like, okay, not the Gimp men, right? And he was like, no, it's just. No, it's not. So it was like, what do we do? What do we do? And then Jeremy was like, stig. And Stigs were new boys at our school. That's what they were called. Right. Stig was a new boy for the first year, when they always wondered where.

[Interviewer/Podcast Host]

The name came from.

[Andy Wilman]

Yeah, they did all the jobs and that became that. And then sure enough, he took off because people did start to go. And, you know, you got social media now. It's becoming a force. Who's the stick?

[Interviewer/Podcast Host]

And everyone thought it was.

[Andy Wilman]

Yeah, it's always Damon Hill.

[Interviewer/Podcast Host]

Yeah, I love that as a Formula one lover growing up. Yeah, I loved it when you got Michael Schumacher on the show. Not only was it that you got Michael Schumacher, but what you got him to talk about as well, like A, no one got him, and B, no one really was able to probe him in areas they didn't want to talk about. And you managed that.

[Andy Wilman]

Jerry and I done a series on that man. Jesus God, he's my hero. Not Jeremy, the other one. Why Schumacher?

We saw him more than once, we come across him more than once and I think we watched him grow from being a boy under the sort of control of like Briatore. I don't mean that like nastily, but he becomes his own man. He gets married when he goes to Ferrari, you know the magnitude of that job. Every Ferrari driver who goes there moans if it's not right. Did we ever hear him moan? And he had. He goes there, the car's a dog in 96 and he knows he's in for a four or five year plan to bring him back to glory. And I remember Ross Braun saying, you know, lunchtime, he's playing football with the mechanics. He likes a game of football, but he knows this is all part of it. The big superstar driver is with the mechanics. He is with them all the time. You do stuff together. He'd go around the factory, shakes hands with everyone, sweeping the floor, everybody at Christmas and it's like. And Braun's going, people don't see this. They just see the villain on the track. They don't see what he's doing in that factory. We did this series for the BBC in the 90s called Late 90s, called the Science of Speed. Nothing to do with Top Gear. It was a BBC1 science thing, science of Speed. And one episode's about fast people. You've got to have him. Ross Braun fixes it up. Schumacher says, yes, we go over to Mijello because they're testing there and it's the week before he goes to Japan and it's a decider in Mohakonen. So he's got a lot on his plate.

We talked to him at the track, he drives Jeremy around a bit and we said, we want to talk to you some more. And he goes, come to the hotel then this evening. And Sabine, his manager, says, yeah, we can have half an hour there with him. So you go ahead and get set up. So we go to the hotel and it's this four star hotel in Mijello. Best one in town. But this is what it is, businessman's hotel. We go in and we're like, oh, we can't do him in his room. That'll be Shit, you know? So I go to the manager behind the bar, to behind the reception, I go, can we close your bar for an hour to do an interview? And he went, no, no. And I was like, it's for Michael Schumacher. And he went. And his face was like Basil Fawlty. That moment of realization, he goes, moment. And then it's like empties the whole bar of everybody. We've got the bar, we set up and we talk with Schumacher in there and he mucks about with Jeremy, plays slapsies with him to talk about hand eye coordination. He's like, this is least scientific thing I've ever done. We ask him about bumping into Villeneuve and knocking him off. Yeah, and this is the crucial bit for me, about what a man. We ask him about it. It gives a good answer. He goes, I knew it wasn't right. I absolutely knew it wasn't right. But I grew up in that era of Mansell, Senna, Pross, piquet, where they played fast and loose. That was a tough driver era, you know, where they just, they were the stars of it, he said. And that was in me, definitely that. That's. That's my schooling. So I did it and I knew it wasn't right. Do the interview on that. And then he talks about how much faster he thinks Hackinen is than him on the day. So really lovely interview. Then Sabine goes, wind up half an hour, we start packing everything up. And he sits there and he's like, so what happens now? And I was like, well, we're just packing stuff up. And he goes, what are you doing? I said, well, we're just gonna have a beer while we're packing up. And he goes, does this bar stay shut until you empty it out? And I went, yeah. And he goes, well, I'll have a beer then, because. And then he has a beer, he stays for another half an hour and he explains how. He goes, you gotta understand, in Italy, I come into the hotel, I can't go out. I go to my room, ring my wife, I have dinner, serve, you know, room service, watch telly. That's my life. And he goes, I'm in a bar and it was just like joyous talking to him. Anyway, where I'm going with this story. I saw Ronnie Corbett anecdote, but he.

[Interviewer/Podcast Host]

Like another of my heroes, he.

[Andy Wilman]

A year later, we've cut that interview together. We need the footage, Bernie. I ring Bernie and I say, so we need this, this and this. We need him in the wet, in hereth, blah, blah, blah. And we need him bashing into Villeneuve. And Bernie goes, you're not having that footage, son. And I was like, no, but we need that because he's talked about that. So we need him just smacking into Vilna. And he went, nah, you're not having that, son. That's in the vaults now. That's history. No one wants to see that again. I was like, bernie, we've done a whole chat with him, we gotta cover it with something. He went, not having it. Sorry, I know you woke. You want it, but you're not having it. Phone goes down. Half an hour later, it's Mr. Eccleston for you. I've changed my mind, you can have the footage. And I was like, oh, Bernie, thanks. He went, all I want is a signed fax from Michael saying he's happy about it and it's a year on, and I'm like.

So we get hold of Willie Weber, Schumacher's manager, and Willie Webber, tell him what we want. And Willie Webber goes, I'm with Bernie. I'm going to say to Michael, that's a no, because it is the past. We're all done with that now. It's buried. New era, it's done. I'll tell Michael no, but I'll pass it on. Willy Webb. Half an hour later, Michael said.

[Advertiser/Announcer]

Oof.

[Andy Wilman]

Yeah, but I did do the interview and I did talk to them. So, yeah, they get the footage.

[Interviewer/Podcast Host]

What a man. Man of his word.

[Andy Wilman]

Yeah. So he means a lot, that man. Not just because he got his stuff, it was just the way he became his own man. And he had values. Yeah, yeah.

[Interviewer/Podcast Host]

You get a bit emotional talking.

[Andy Wilman]

Oh, yeah, yeah.

[Interviewer/Podcast Host]

Why is that?

[Andy Wilman]

Cuz it's just like fate is such a prick that a man of his abilities and he stops. Doesn't he stop to help a kid up who's fallen over skiing, what the fuck, you know? And then toe rags go along through life getting no comeuppance.

He would have done so much as an ambassador for whatever he wanted to be.

[Interviewer/Podcast Host]

Yeah.

[Andy Wilman]

And again on the track, that day was so funny, you know, when Jeremy went, I've got some other questions for you. And Schumacher went, I'm sure you do. You know, like he knew there were tough ones coming. Like he's so at peace.

[Interviewer/Podcast Host]

Yeah, yeah, yeah. We then come towards the end of your time on Top Gear and the infamous Jeremy Clarkson punch of a producer. I mean, do you get jaded talking about this? You must have talked about it so often or thought about it.

[Andy Wilman]

No one talked about it a lot. I was Never there. And I'm never gonna talk about it in the sense that if anybody wants me to unpack it, I won't because one, I was never there. Two, Jeremy and the producer have agreed never to talk about it. So it's their business. Yeah, it's absolutely their business. So all of us just like, that's it. We respect that. And everyone who's got an opinion about it has got it.

So what I focused on in the book was I'm with him in that period when he's suspended to get him fired. Cause he turns himself in after he's had the bust up and then he's suspended.

[Interviewer/Podcast Host]

How do you mean, turns himself in?

[Andy Wilman]

Well, he rings Danny Cohen, who's the boss of the BBC and goes, been a bus stop, you know, gun and badge on the desk, and he's suspended. And then at that point, he's sitting, waiting because he's done whatever interviews he's gonna do. The BBC interview other people. The press are circling.

The BBC are doing their internal talking, as we've just seen, with the shit show that they went through the last couple of weeks. We know that internal talking is never clear lines, it's all over the place, but it's going on.

Nobody talks to me because one, I'm not there. Two, they don't think I've got any. There is. And they're fair. That's fair. I've got nothing to offer. The only thing I go to offer is like, do you realize how much our show was falling apart at the seams? The wheels were coming off.

[Interviewer/Podcast Host]

Could you explain that for us?

[Andy Wilman]

Just that pressure in that last series we were filming, the whole thing was collapsing in on itself. Our timetables, our everything. We went on air and we still had three shows worth of films to shoot. And once you do that, that's like starting an F1 season and you still haven't built the front of the car. You know, you're like, well, we'll do it as we go.

[Interviewer/Podcast Host]

And is that because you guys weren't doing what you used to do, or.

[Andy Wilman]

Was it just the timetable? Shrunk and shrunk, Right, okay. You lose a bit from that series. You lose a bit from that. You know, you finish your film a bit later. We had this golden rule before we go into studio to record the studios, which is one a week, have all the films shot. Because when you go into studio Monday, you're looking at films and getting them ready to lock. Tuesday, the lads are in writing their stuff for the Wednesday studio record. Wednesday, studio Record Thursday, I'm with the other guys editing the studio and the film packages together. Show goes out Sunday, where in that you go and shoot a big film. But that's what happened. So people were like, Wednesday night you'd finish the studio record and then it's off to a location to film Thursday, Friday, Saturday month, you know, and it's just. It was collapsing in itself. We were a big team.

[Interviewer/Podcast Host]

And this incident and that sentence, that was it.

[Andy Wilman]

That was it.

[Interviewer/Podcast Host]

They weren't unrelated, right? Yeah.

[Andy Wilman]

I'm not going to sit here and go, so everybody's excused their behavior. That was the environment. My point to you was nobody came to the BBC and talked about it. And I didn't go and offer it either. Yeah, because it would have probably. They would have gone, well, it's irrelevant. You should have run show better. Fine. So it was just sitting and waiting and we didn't talk much because I think like blokes, you can talk about how your team did what your favorite spaghetti is, but you never get into deep stuff. So we just didn't talk much. So I kind of observed and I watched. You know, there were a few big PR supremo guys who were like going, do you want some help? You know, do you want some management? Reputational management help? And he just kept saying no and no, putting the phone down, sat in his flat and he cut himself off. And I think my interpretation is.

He knew this now this huge thing was in jeopardy and he was waiting for his punishment because.

Although he's top of the tree, teams are so important to him. To be part of one. The crappy little beer and sausage rolls thing we'd have after every studio record, all the sort of sell by date brown food from Sainsbury's. We'd snarf on that. He loved it. It was like, this is our moment when we've done a good show, we eat this shit, we have a beer, then we go home and it's all the crew, cameras, everybody runners.

He was happiest in that environment.

So there was no star behavior.

[Interviewer/Podcast Host]

So was it.

[Andy Wilman]

I think that's what he. He's like. He's put in jeopardy. That's a problem, right?

[Interviewer/Podcast Host]

Not losing his highly paid TV job. It was about the people.

[Andy Wilman]

It's the show. The show's become everything to us for all the reasons I've said, be it through our insecurities or whatever. And that's what's. That's what's going down the bog now. So there may have been a bit as well we were all so exhausted that did we go.

Shall we let it crash?

You know, it's fate telling us to stop. I don't know that bit.

I don't know that bit. But we sort of.

We weren't kicking the, you know, the public doing those million strong petitions were fighting much harder than we ever were in terms of on the front foot, if that makes sense.

[Interviewer/Podcast Host]

Yeah, it does make sense. Maybe that's an indicator that you can probably only reflect on now, a few years later, that maybe you were just done that.

[Andy Wilman]

We were done, yeah. And we still had allies. We had people who didn't like us, but we still had allies. But maybe it was a full stop. We just had Argentina as well. We got through that. So maybe we were just thinking, bloody hell, this is a shit show that maybe has to end.

[Interviewer/Podcast Host]

And when did you know it had ended?

[Andy Wilman]

When the BBC decided to fire him. And I get it now, I didn't at the time. They can't tell anyone. They briefed, I think the Daily Telegraph the night before because that BBC news machine, they're good at briefing, so the PR machine. So they briefed them the night before that he was going to be fired. And it was quite telling. Their brief, the Telegraph, not the Guardian. It was like a right wing paper. So I thought, okay, it's quite clever because everyone will believe it from the Telegraph. And then.

The announcement was made at, I don't know, 10 o' clock that next morning, 10:30. But not a word had been said to anybody in the Top Gear crew. So we're in the office just waiting to do something or think to do another day. And it comes on the telly and we've got Top Gear magazine, Top Gear tv and we're two offices next to each other and. And there it is. Jeremy Clarkson's contract will not be renewed, blah, blah, blah. And you're like, fuck me, that's it, that's it. It's actually happened. I don't think Jeremy knows it, I think he's got the call, but they've coordinated it so that it's like BBC News know, all the outlets know. And then I was just livid that they hadn't told us, but I knew that now in hindsight you could never tell us. Cause we had just gone mental with it. Yeah. So I rang the Top. The PR guy who I knew had orchestrated it, called him a four letter word that probably can't be used here. He didn't care because he's got other to do, you know, he's doing what he's doing. He's not interested in what I've got to say at that point. It's just. I'm just ranting. And then you called Jeremy, spoke to Jeremy. I can't remember what we said from memory. Then he's phone off. You know, gone around to his flat, but he's phone off. And then there's that slow process of getting back together again, where the dust settles a little. The BBC asked me to carry on. I'm like, you literally don't understand what you've lost.

[Interviewer/Podcast Host]

Do you think they didn't realize what they had?

[Andy Wilman]

No, no, not a clue. I mean, not their fault. Cause we'd kept the doors shut on it. We gave them the show every week and they go, wow. And that's popular and everything, but they didn't know what we're doing. They didn't know how tight the Office was. They didn't know how close we all were, that we'd become like this dysfunctional family and how long everyone had been together. They didn't see what had gone into the making of it, to be fair. Why should they? Cause we didn't let anyone in. We didn't have an open day. Look at us at work. That's the food that's been there on the floor for six months. We didn't have a sort of day like that. But, yeah, it was. I think the BBC then has that moment where it actually knows it's fooling itself slightly going, so we carry on, we get some new people. Top Gear's our show. We carry on. And they're kind of hoping, asking someone like me.

And I was like, I was polite, but then I had put my hand upon notice in going, I can't do this. You know, I'm not doing it without him. I'm not making a Top Gear. Cause it isn't a show. It's the thing we made. And then the four of us find ourselves, like, looking for a home again.

[Interviewer/Podcast Host]

And did they try and keep you, but also keep James and didn't try.

[Andy Wilman]

And keep me apart from that first. Would you do the show right, controller? BBC2 was like, what should we do next? Next steps? And I was like, leave me alone, please. And then said. I said, no, I'm off.

So then they tried to keep Richard and James, which was a very smart move.

Because to cut the four of us in half, suddenly Jeremy and I are not a good less of a proposition out in the world because it's.

[Interviewer/Podcast Host]

A threesome where everything actually that it would work in the BBC's favor to split you up. So you weren't, you couldn't go and be a powerful force.

[Andy Wilman]

Yeah. Because I think they knew deep down, they knew without Jeremy, they're damaged below the waterline. But they then are on that mission, that self righteous mission to go Top Gear is, is our property and it's bigger than anyone who hosts it. They're on that mission. They'll tell themselves that. So to get that going again, the easiest thing to do if I'm not gonna do it is they're gonna keep Richard and James cause they split us four, they literally take us off the chessboard and you've got two of the much loved people. And I think at that point they think, and then we can work out the rest, you know, we'll somehow work out the rest. It won't have Jeremy, but it'll work. That was their logic.

Wow.

[Interviewer/Podcast Host]

So did you think at one point that you wouldn't get Richard and James with you?

[Andy Wilman]

I never allowed myself thinking. But it was a real threat. It was a real threat. We just agreed a three year deal to do more before Jeremy got fired. And then so that's gone. The big three year deal, good money. So they could say to Richard and James, you know, that deal's back on the table for you guys in a bit more sort of thing. So the money's good. Why would they not? And then they said, you can also run the show editorially. Massive hook.

Massive hook. And I think their third point was, you know, Jeremy's proven that he can be a liability. Why do you want to be saddled to a, you know, saddle your coach to a horse that's always out of control. You can just carry on as before, less problems, blah, blah, blah. We eventually the four of us had a chat about this situation. We were really grown up around at Jeremy's flat and Richard and James were like, that's the offer. And we were like, fucking hell, it's a good offer, can't argue with that offer.

And Richard especially was like, but if we can stay together, it would be good, but we've gotta have something to go to. It's gotta be. He didn't mean like a counter offer, like, I'll sit here, you work it out. Yeah, he'd be good at. He said we have to have something that's solid that we can go to. American agents luckily had seen the news and they don't give a shit about.

Fracas. So they're like on the phone going, do you wanna sign with us? The Agent's like, sign with us and we'll find you a home. So we did that. We picked an agency, went with them, and then quickly it became a discussion between Netflix and Amazon and they were both offering good money. But we like the fact that Amazon were. I mean, Netflix were already there in terms of output size, everything, and Amazon in terms of TV were down here. So we were thought, let's go with the runtime, because it's a bit like the logic of when the BBC asked us to go on to BBC1, when our numbers got big, we always refused and stayed on BBC2 deliberately, because we were like, if we go on BBC1 with our 8 million, we'll just be there below EastEnders and we'll be like a hit. Whereas if we're with our 8 million on BBC2, we look like fucking, you know, rock stars. It's just perception, smoke and mirrors. But there we are. So we thought, we'll get looked after at Amazon, because Amazon had a plan, which was to launch prime globally and they needed a show. They didn't have a show to do it. And we. If it worked out, we'd be that show.

[Interviewer/Podcast Host]

Would you ever consider helping the BBC to recreate Top Gear?

[Andy Wilman]

Yeah. No, I don't think. They wouldn't want our help anyway. They wouldn't want our help. And.

They do need someone who wants to bring that show back. It will never come back. People keep asking. This is my personal opinion. I don't think it will ever come back, ever, unless somebody in the building has a will to do it. But I can't imagine there is a will to do it. You know, Freddie's terrible accent knocked the stuffing out of the show. And it's right and proper that everyone just like, collapses and licks their wounds and everything else and mourns.

But then there's nobody left afterwards who goes, right, what do we do about this show now? No one in the building is doing that. Nobody is interested in doing that.

[Interviewer/Podcast Host]

Also, with no Grand Tour, there is no motoring show on the television.

[Andy Wilman]

There isn't. There's just a farming show.

[Interviewer/Podcast Host]

What an interesting conversation with Andy, someone who's worked in TV and in motor racing coverage for years. I loved that conversation. So when I was working at the BBC, there was this rumor that Andy Willman was, like, this hard man. You couldn't get near him. You couldn't get near Top Gear. He kind of ruled with an iron fist. He was very much in charge of every single thing that happened and was kind of untouchable. And I think. I think that came across in the conversation that he did allow himself to get to that point, but I wasn't prepared for the emotion that he showed when talking about his team and when talking about the moment that everything fell apart. The challenges of leading a team under a huge amount of pressure, the fact that he was taking antidepressants. And again, it's a reminder that people who are absolutely at the very, very top of their own world, it doesn't mean that everything is great all the time and sometimes the greatest success carries the greatest cost. But what a life, what stories. I mean, I basically want to go to the pub with him for about another three hours and just get some drinks in and carry on talking about May and Hammond and Clarkson and Top Gear and everything else. But obviously what happened after Top Gear is equally fascinating, which was the deal to go to Amazon. And if you tune right now to our other podcast room where it happened, you can hear Andy talking about how they had a decision to make. Was it Netflix or was it Amazon? He reveals to us how much the Grand Tour tent cost and you will not believe the number that he shares with us. We also talk about the times that maybe they got things wrong on the Grand Tour, why they had to start with a huge opener, and also the secret to Clarkson's farm, why he believes that the farm is the happiest, most joyful program he's ever done, and why he puts it right up there with Top Gear. Check out the rest of our chat with Andy right now on Run where it happened and we'll see you again soon. Right here on High performance.

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[Andy Wilman]

Dear Career Ladder, you've had your moment. You're linear and one dimensional. Ambition doesn't just go up anymore. It zigs and zags and squiggles. We're CEOs, executives, founders. We're advising companies, launching side hustles, taking breaks, defining our next act, ambition on our turn. The possibilities are endless. Chief Lead on join [e-mail].