If you’re a lover of the British car show Top Gear but wish it featured more Chevys and fewer Bentleys, then your day has arrived as Top Gear America has just been announced.
The new series will take the series’ tire-burning action over to this side of the pond with a new trio of hosts. Comedic actors Dax Shepard and Rob Corddry will bring the laughs while British auto journalist/car racer Jethro Bovingdon will provide the auto industry bona fides. Also along for the ride — literally — will be the forever-helmeted test-driver known only as “The Stig.”
Out of the two more non-traditional hosts, Corddry and Shepard, it seems that the latter is more of the car guy. “Cars are my full-time hobby. It’s the only reason I act: to acquire money to buy s–t that you put gas in,” the CHiPS star told MotorTrend. Shepard is also an experienced racer in his own right, and he believes there may be a rivalry on the horizon between him and Bovingdon. “I think there’ll be a lot of competition between Jethro and I, in a loving way,” Shepard said, “Obviously, he’ll win, and sometimes I’ll win, and it’ll be devastating when I lose, and I think that’ll be fun for everyone to watch. Jethro’s definitely got the seat-time advantage on me, and I’ve not driven any of these cars. I’ve never driven a McLaren or half the (cars) that he’s driven.”
Then there’s Corddry, and let’s just say the Daily Show veteran is taking a bit of a different approach to the new series. “I told them, when they called me, you know, I was a big fan of Top Gear, the original,” Corddry said. “And I said, ‘Look, I’m none of those guys. I’m an enthusiast. I’m, if anything else, the audience.’ But I’m not gonna say no to something like this. I’m just gonna fool them for as long as I can. And then they’re finally going to be like, ‘Wait a minute, this guy doesn’t know what he’s talking about. Let’s get some boring dude in here.'”
The hopefully non-boring Top Gear America will debut next spring on the MotorTrend app.
