I’M flabbergasted,’ declares Jeremy Clarkson, the notoriously outspoken motoring journalist, and presenter, when asked if he ever thought he would end up making one of the most popular and talked-about television series of this year—about farming. ‘I honestly thought it would serve up a gentle disappointment to fans of Top Gear and The Grand Tour, who have watched me for years, but it’s gone berserk.’
He is talking, of course, about Clarkson’s Farm, Amazon Prime’s eight-part programme documenting Mr. Clarkson’s hapless attempts to farm the 1,000 acres he’s owned in the Cotswolds village of Chadlington, Oxfordshire, since 2008.
Despite being dismissed by The Guardian as ‘eight hours of a buffoon screwing things up for our supposed entertainment’, the series—which details Mr. Clarkson’s travails, from buying a tractor (opting for a 10-ton Lamborghini, which everyone mocks for being too large) to being forced to hire a local contractor, Kaleb Cooper, who’s soon chastising his employer for making a right mess of drilling a field by going freestyle with the tramlines—quickly became one of the streaming giant’s biggest hits. Watching Mr. Clarkson chase his herd of 76 ‘sheeps’ on their frequent bids for freedom or trying to have a conversation with Gerald Cooper, a dry-stone waller with an impenetrable local accent, it’s easy to see the program’s comedic appeal. However, by poking fun at his own lack of knowledge and skill, Mr. Clarkson —an often controversially forthright character, sacked from Top Gear by the BBC after a fracas with a producer—has brought the harsh realities of farming to a much-needed wider audience.
Denne historien er fra September 01, 2021-utgaven av Country Life UK.
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Denne historien er fra September 01, 2021-utgaven av Country Life UK.
Start din 7-dagers gratis prøveperiode på Magzter GOLD for å få tilgang til tusenvis av utvalgte premiumhistorier og 9000+ magasiner og aviser.
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Save our family farms
IT Tremains to be seen whether the Government will listen to the more than 20,000 farming people who thronged Whitehall in central London on November 19 to protest against changes to inheritance tax that could destroy countless family farms, but the impact of the good-hearted, sombre crowds was immediate and positive.
A very good dog
THE Spanish Pointer (1766–68) by Stubbs, a landmark painting in that it is the artist’s first depiction of a dog, has only been exhibited once in the 250 years since it was painted.
The great astral sneeze
Aurora Borealis, linked to celestial reindeer, firefoxes and assassinations, is one of Nature's most mesmerising, if fickle displays and has made headlines this year. Harry Pearson finds out why
'What a good boy am I'
We think of them as the stuff of childhood, but nursery rhymes such as Little Jack Horner tell tales of decidedly adult carryings-on, discovers Ian Morton
Forever a chorister
The music-and way of living-of the cabaret performer Kit Hesketh-Harvey was rooted in his upbringing as a cathedral chorister, as his sister, Sarah Sands, discovered after his death
Best of British
In this collection of short (5,000-6,000-word) pen portraits, writes the author, 'I wanted to present a number of \"Great British Commanders\" as individuals; not because I am a devotee of the \"great man, or woman, school of history\", but simply because the task is interesting.' It is, and so are Michael Clarke's choices.
Old habits die hard
Once an antique dealer, always an antique dealer, even well into retirement age, as a crop of interesting sales past and future proves
It takes the biscuit
Biscuit tins, with their whimsical shapes and delightful motifs, spark nostalgic memories of grandmother's sweet tea, but they are a remarkably recent invention. Matthew Dennison pays tribute to the ingenious Victorians who devised them
It's always darkest before the dawn
After witnessing a particularly lacklustre and insipid dawn on a leaden November day, John Lewis-Stempel takes solace in the fleeting appearance of a rare black fox and a kestrel in hot pursuit of a pipistrelle bat
Tarrying in the mulberry shade
On a visit to the Gainsborough Museum in Sudbury, Suffolk, in August, I lost my husband for half an hour and began to get nervous. Fortunately, an attendant had spotted him vanishing under the cloak of the old mulberry tree in the garden.
