Top Gear of 1970s and the 1980s

27 January 2022

Many of us have been following the brilliant ‘Top Gear’ for much of our lives and it’s changed formats and line-ups a number of times over the years. Andrew Roberts picks up the story of an amazing anniversary…

Can it really be twenty years since the revised Top Gear aired on BBC2? But 20th of October 2002 marked the day that Clarkson, May and Hammond became The Goodies for the early 21st century and creating a ‘Hover Van’ was a far cry from the programme’s first incarnation - a Midlands regional show broadcast every month from the BBC’s Pebble Mill Studios.

The original edition aired on Friday 22nd April 1977, and your hosts were Tom Coyne and Angela Rippon. The producer Derek Smith believed “there was a lot of interest in motoring – and particularly motoring in this area of the country. We are very conscious that there is very little cover for the motorist’s interest”. As for the theme tune, Jessica was a track from The Allman Brothers’ 1973 album Brothers and Sisters.

In fact, the BBC had previously broadcast car programmes, such as Wheelbase, which ran from 1964 to 1975. The pioneer TG used the magazine format common to so many late ‘seventies shows and featured Ms. Rippon driving from Shepherd’s Bush to the West Midlands in a Ford Capri Ghia Mk. II -Including a wonderful review of the Granada Motorway Services - “Egg & chips and a cup of coffee – a pound. That’s not exactly cheap, is it?”

Meanwhile, the editor of Motor Sport patronisingly wrote – “Angela Rippon, BBC Newscaster, is a girl of many parts. When we received a BBC hand-out announcing that she was to have her own BBC Motoring Programme, we tried to obtain more of her motoring background than that she is a keen driver who covers 25,000 miles a year and frequently drives from London and Birmingham to her home in Plymouth”.

By July 1978, TG was fully networked as a weekly series. However, a critic at The Guardian was dubious about its prospects – “Clearly rather a lot of us own cars, and quite possibly many of us need them. Does that stop them being boring?” The Evening Standard was even more dismissive – “Bottom gear television, perhaps”. But Top Gear did indeed become a fixture on BBC2, with Noel Edmonds becoming the host in the following year. He was very much at home as a motoring journalist, even if he did not think overly highly of the Fiat Strada:

Sue Baker joined the programme in 1980, and by 1981 her co-presenters were William Woollard and Chris Goffey. The mood was now more akin to a television version of Car magazine, with Mr. W somewhat underwhelmed by the Sinclair C5.

The Executive Producer Tom Ross recalled that by 1986 “I was told by my local manager at the BBC’s studios at Pebble Mill in Birmingham that the show was on its last legs with six months to live. Things got even worse when Alan Yentob took over as controller of BBC2”. Jon Bentley became the series producer in 1987, and he introduced new presenters - Tiff Needell, and, on 27th October 1988, a young gentleman with quite incredible hair named Jeremy Clarkson:

Ten years later, sensible tweed sports jackets and reviews of boot space already seemed to belong to another age. But for TG fans, this 1979 excerpt shows the original format at its best:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M5wBHmHGlGs.

Not least for a chance to see a Lada Niva and a Subaru 1800 GLF in action.