The former Top Gear host, 66, believes the only way British TV can \u201csurvive\u201d is if the likes of BBC, ITV, Sky, Channel 4 and Channel 5 create shows together.<\/p>\n
He added: \u201cTelevision has to get bigger, lose scheduling and get better.<\/p>\n
\u201cI actually think that TV in this country can only survive – and should do this – if the whole lot merge.<\/p>\n
\u201cPeople are draining away from the industry and it\u2019s a huge pool of talent and I think if we had one great big thing – Britflix, let\u2019s call it – we could all club together and make good programmes.<\/p>\n
\u201cBut bigger, better and fewer programmes.\u201d<\/p>\n
Clarkson this month admitted he felt \u201csad\u201d to hear Monty Don was leaving BBC show Gardeners\u2019 World.<\/p>\n
In his column for the Sunday Times newspaper, Clarkson wrote: \u201cDespite [my own gardening] ineptitude, I do watch Gardeners\u2019 World and that\u2019s why I was sad this week to hear that after 23 years, Monty is leaving the show.<\/p>\n
\u201cAnd I\u2019m even sadder now because I\u2019ve realised he will have to be replaced, and I have the most horrible feeling that whoever gets the gig will not be the sort of person who wears corduroy. The material of choice for anyone with a safe, gentle pair of hands.\u201d<\/p>\n
Clarkson insisted he\u2019s worried the new host will not be hired for their gardening expertise, and claimed the show should follow The Grand Tour because all three new presenters \u2013 Francis Bourgeois, James Engelsman and Thomas Holland \u2013 are knowledgeable about cars.<\/p>\n
He added: \u201cAs I\u2019m sure you\u2019ve noticed, there\u2019s been a trend in recent years for television shows to be presented by \u2018characters\u2019.<\/p>\n
\u201cPeople with regional accents who wear brightly coloured jumpers with rainbows on them. People who think that being zany is the same as being funny.<\/p>\n
\u201cThere\u2019s also a trend to hire people who have absolutely no idea what they\u2019re talking about. It\u2019s one of the things that\u2019s made the new hosts of The Grand Tour work so well: they do.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The former Top Gear host, 66, believes the only way British TV can \u201csurvive\u201d is if the likes…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":616737,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[4523,18221,156,67252,117,111,139,69,90,1041,1305,61,44133,276974,19135],"class_list":["post-616736","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-entertainment","tag-ambitious","tag-clarkson","tag-entertainment","tag-jeremy","tag-new","tag-new-zealand","tag-newzealand","tag-nz","tag-on","tag-rival","tag-show","tag-to","tag-traitors","tag-unbelievably","tag-working"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/616736","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=616736"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/616736\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/616737"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=616736"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=616736"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=616736"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}