James May: No 'Top Gear' without Clarkson; BBC wants female lead

[AF News Desk]

James May is ruling out returning to the show with Richard Hammond if Jeremy Clarkson is not a part of the cast. Photo by Jon Large



Last three unaired episodes will be released without host segments


BBC host James May is ruling out returning to "Top Gear" without Jeremy Clarkson being part of the trio, The Guardian reports, and has called the prospect of a replacement for Clarkson starring alongside himself and Richard Hammond "lame."
“It has to be the three of us. You can’t just put a surrogate Jeremy in and expect it to carry on. It would be forced. I don’t believe they would be stupid enough to try that," May told MediaGuardian this week.
At the same time, May is not ruling all all three hosts returning to the show at some point in the future.

"I don’t think you could carry on with two people and put someone in as the new Jeremy because they are not going to be the new Jeremy. That would be short-sighted and I don’t think it would work. Virtually impossible," May said in comments to The Guardian.


The contracts of May and Hammond expired at the end of March of 2015 and the network is not currently holding any talks with any of the three hosts to continue. A number of presenters were reported to have been approached by the BBC to become a part of an entirely new cast. The Week reported earlier that Jodie Kidd, Johnny Vaughan, Chris Evans, Stephen Fry and Steve Coogan may be in consideration for an all-new lineup of hosts.

Meanwhile, the BBC announced that the remaining episodes of "Top Gear" that had been almost completed and scheduled to air when the "fracas" scandal erupted would indeed be aired later this summer, but without the host segments which had not been taped at that point. There were three unaired episodes in the pipeline when Clarkson was suspended from the network, with the BBC declining to extend his contract with the show.

"It is serious and unfortunate what happened but there is no ban on Jeremy being on the BBC," BBC2 controller Kim Shillinglaw told The Guardian. "It’s a big deal what happened and Jeremy, as any human being would, needs some time out."


More importantly, Shillinglaw confirmed to The Guardian that "Top Gear" would return in a new form in 2016, and that BBC executives were looking for women presenters to lead the show.

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