We’re less than 24 hours out from the start of the Top Gear Festival in Sydney, and already Top Gear host Jeremy Clarkson has sworn never to come back to Australia. So what tipped him over the edge?
Image: Brendon Thorne/Stringer/Getty
Update: Top Gear presenter Andy Wilman speaks. Scroll down for the update.
After arriving to a relatively pleasant photo call yesterday on Sydney Harbour with co-host, James May and Top Gear Australia host Shane Jacobson, everything seemed to be going well for the scandal-prone Top Gear presenters.
You may remember last time that Clarkson was in the country for a Top Gear show, he called British Prime Minister Gordon Brown a “one-eyed, Scottish idiot”. That wasn’t a political comment: PM Brown does actually only have one functioning eye after an incident at a rugby match when he was but a lad, meaning that Clarkson was forced by interest groups to make an apology for his comments.
To avoid scandals like that happening on this trip, Clarkson’s media appearances have been kept to a minimum. Less airtime means less chance to say something stupid, right? Not exactly.
News Limited today reports that Clarkson won’t ever be coming back to Australia after he, co-presenter May and a third-party were chased down by the paparazzi last night in the Sydney waterfront suburb of Woolloomooloo.
A video of photographers chasing the team has been posted, in which one member of the party says that “you are the reason we’re never coming back here”. It is also being reported that Clarkson said that one of the photographers ought to be “thrown into the river”.
Update:/> Top Gear producer, Andy Wilman has fired back about the altercation, saying that the man who allegedly spoke on Clarkson’s behalf is nothing more than “a halfwit”, and that the statements were indeed untrue.
Clarkson threw an update at Twitter making light of the whole affair:
So I had a conversation last night about how I would never go back to Austria. And NOW look what ‘s happened.
— Jeremy Clarkson (@JeremyClarkson) March 7, 2013
[News]
Gizmodo Australia will be at the Sydney Top Gear Festival this weekend. Let us know if you’re going in the comments!