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BBC boss denies Clarkson was offered Top Gear return

"They asked if I'd come back to Top Gear," claims Jeremy Clarkson -but not according to BBC execs.

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The BBC has denied suggestions it offered Jeremy Clarkson his old job back on Top Gear.

Clarkson has recently said, “I had a meeting with a BBC executive last week and they asked if I’d come back to Top Gear.

“But it was never an option, even with the one million people signing the Bring Back Clarkson petition — for which I was extremely humbled.”

Clarkson’s friend Carol Vorderman witnessed the meeting but said she did not hear the conversation.

Meanwhile Tony Hall Director-General of the BBC has since told BBC1, “I made it absolutely clear when I said we were going to part company that that was it.”

Last week BBC announced Chris Evans to be the host of the new-look motoring show, with Hall backing him as presenter-producer.

“I hope that edge will be there, and I hope that sense of danger is going to be there,” he said. “I hope it really appeals to all the people who liked the old Top Gear, but we can also bring in people who maybe were put off by how the programme was in the past.”

When asked about potential co-presenters, he said, “I’d like to see some women in the presenting team. But look, I also need to leave it to Chris, to the team, Kim Shillinglaw (controller of BBC2) to make up their mind about what they think is going to work best.”

A spokesperson for the BBC said, “We haven’t offered (Clarkson) another Top Gear contract and the BBC had placed on record its thanks to Jeremy for his broadcasting on the programme and wish him well for the future.”

Source: Radio Times, The Mirror

3 Responses

    1. I think the new version will flop over time. The USA version works well but from what I’ve heard America wasn’t a huge fan of the UK version so there was little to reference. UK like Australia are fans of the Clarkson version and we all know what happened to the Australian one.

      1. Because the local version was cheap crap-a large part of the UK version’s success was /is the production values and budget for doing stunts/events-that will continue.

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