Originally Posted by AlexiR:
“This is a fair point I hadn't actually given much thought to.
It might also be worth considering that Clarkson and co. would potentially have to be much more PC on a commercial broadcaster than they ever were on the BBC. How do we think advertisers would have reacted to the whole n-word scandal? Or any of the other offensive comments Clarkson has made over the years? In a weird way he's been able to get away with a lot of this stuff because he's on the BBC.
On a final note I think its possible people are hammering the nails in the coffin of Top Gear a little too quickly.
Obviously its going to depend on who the BBC bring in to front the show moving forward and what, if any, format changes they make but I'm not entirely convinced by the notion that the show dies without Clarkson. And I'm even less convinced that a show fronted by Clarkson (or the Top Gear trio) on another channel does anywhere near as well.”
BIB1: I made the same point earlier … I'm not point-scoring here, as it was popbitch who predicted that Sky might not be the automatic home for Clarkson many people seemed to think because of its diversity policy. (They also cited the Andy Gray/Richard Keys débâcle - i.e. if Sky were prepared to tolerate Clarkson, why did their position become so untenable?)
Other broadcasters have the diversity policies and, as you rightly say, Clarkson could get away with much more at the BBC than he could elsewhere. And that's before you get to the whole business with product reputation. He really has screwed this up for himself royally.
BIB2: totally agree. How many times have we seen doom and gloom abound when a presenter/actor leaves a show and people hysterically declare it's all over now, then the brand survives? TG makes too much money for the BBC to parachute the likes of Joan Bakewell into it - and, given the perilous state of the Licence Fee, it's going to need that kind of income more than ever.