Despite him knowing nothing about farming, Jeremy Clarkson’s new series follows him during a gruelling 12 months when he decided to try to run the 1,000-acre farm near Chipping Norton he bought in 2008.
Lacking the relevant skills the 59-year-old broadcaster is forced to lean on a group of agricultural associates led by Kaleb Cooper, pictured below, a Chippy farmer aged a mere 21, his shepherdess Ellen and his land agent Charlie Ireland.
Jeremy and Kaleb. All pictures provided by Amazon Prime
The trailer opens with former Top Gear and The Grand Tour host Clarkson sliding to a halt in a supercar and with his trademark delivery saying to camera: “THIS… has been my day job.”
"This ageing man makes a living out of driving fast and shouting random nonsense," the voiceover remarks.
Charlie, picture below, is realistic about Jeremy’s chances of success on the farm he christens Diddly Squat in anticipation of its productivity .
The car aficionado test drives tractors and, unimpressed by the lack of horse power on the reconditioned models, opts instead for a Lamborghini R8 with 40 forward gears and 40 reverse gears which is so big it gets stuck on a barn door.
Realising he’s out of his depth he calls in Kaleb who’s worked the farm before and berates him when he fails to drive it in straight lines resulting in some very haphazard planting.
Kaleb estimates he can run the cultivator over 435 acres in a week after Jeremy manages 10 acres in a day.
Then there’s the drill. “What drill have you got?” asks Kaleb. “A red one, or is it orange. Reddy orange.”
When Clarkson decides the best way to keep his wild grass fields in check is with a flock of sheep he visits the livestock auction at Thame where he admits: “I know now how my mum felt when she was trying to buy a car. They all look the same.”
He says “By nodding occasionally I seemed to be buying stuff,” and he leaves £11,000 lighter with 78 “sheeps”. (Also a three-piece Dralon suite for the office.)
But the animals prove incredibly difficult to control and a bewildered Jeremy can only watch as they jump a wall when he tries to herd them and when four fall lame and need antibiotics the vet jokes: “I’ll think of a number and double it.”
In one episode he shouts in pain as a sheep kicks him in the privates.
Some of the funniest episodes involve the tupping of the sheep as Clarkson is forced to measure the circumference of the scrotal sacs of the “boy sheep” he’s named Leonardo and Wayne after diCaprio and Rooney.
We see a more emotional side of him when three of the ewes are “scheduled for assassination” after it emerges they have mastitis and can’t be bred from. He looks visibly upset as he drives away from the abattoir.
Clarkson not only has to contend with “Armageddon” weather and unprecedented flooding but a global pandemic.
He admits: “I’m pushing 60, I’ve smoked three-quarters of a million cigarettes and had pneumonia, if I get it there’s not a lot of hope.”
Kaleb agrees.
As lockdown strikes, the lambing season kicks in and because of social distancing Clarkson is faced with delivering his first baby lamb alone, without the help of Shepherdess Ellen.
It starts badly: “Oh god, something’s coming out of it,” and “I think I’ve gone into its anus” but soon he’s, reluctantly, docking tails and castrating males and addressing the camera wearing a long wet plastic glove.
In the face of panic buying he opens the Diddly Squat Farm Shop where he sells only potatoes because his veg is not yet ready and while drinking “lady petrol” with girlfriend Lisa Hogan at sunset in the farmyard it all seems pretty idyllic.
Despite delivering potatoes to the people of Chadlington, there is some friction with the locals when vandals set fire to some haybales but there’s plenty of laughs in a series that also shines a light on how you actually “do” farming and just how backbreaking and shockingly expensive it is.
Jeremy quickly discovers that a modern farmer must also be a conservationist, scientist, shepherd, shopkeeper, midwife, engineer, accountant and tractor driver, often at the same time.
Kaleb, who told me Clarkson is stubborn but takes criticism on the chin, said filming the series was the best year of his life and he binge-watched the whole series and found it hilarious.
The serious ends with an end-of-harvest picnic to make a very big decision; will Jeremy keep on farming?
See our Q&As to find out…
Clarkson's Farm launches on Friday June 11 on Amazon Prime Video.
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