Word: gearing
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Dates: during 2000-2009
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...uninitiated, the BBC show Top Gear might seem an improbable hit. Consider the premise: the weekly, hour-long program features "three middle-aged men fooling around using cars as props," says Jeremy Clarkson, one of its presenters. "That doesn't sound very exciting, does it?" Perhaps these guys are easy on the eye? "They're a bit fat, and they dress like s___," says Andy Wilman, Top Gear's executive producer. "You don't look at them and think, it's Ocean's Eleven coming toward...
...Dowdy and doughy or not, the three men and their show can claim an army of followers. The most popular program on BBC2 - the higher-browed of the Beeb's two main channels - Top Gear regularly pulls in more than 7 million viewers, roughly a quarter of all Britons watching TV during the program's Sunday-night slot. Chalk that up to the show's high speed and high production values: crazy challenges and outlandish races - an Aston Martin versus a train between England and Monte Carlo, for instance (the Aston won) - are, like the rest of the show, beautifully...
...Next step: cash in. The hit U.K. show is already seen in more than 100 countries, from Norway to New Zealand, South Africa to Saudi Arabia; its global audience stands somewhere near 500 million. Almost two dozen local editions of the Top Gear magazine - a best seller in Britain - appear on newsstands worldwide. And foreign versions of the program are next. In September, Australian broadcaster SBS aired the first of eight episodes of its own edition of Top Gear. A pilot of a U.S. version is already in the can, and a Russian series is set to air early next...
...show whose luck stalled just a few years back. In 2001, 24 years after it was launched, Top Gear ran out of gas. Its restart the following year owes much to Wilman and Clarkson, who quit the show in 1999 after just over a decade fronting it. Over beers in a London pub, the two sketched the show's current format: out went the string of turgid, outside-broadcast pieces to camera. In came a cavernous studio. Fresh faces were added. A mystery racing driver, permanently hidden beneath overalls and a crash helmet and known only as "the Stig," injected...
...program's visuals were slicked up, too; deft editing, delicious coloring and crisp sound have made Top Gear as striking as any Italian supercar. Its cool aesthetic, coupled with those proudly uncool presenters, have lent the program broad appeal. Close to half of Top Gear 's British audience is female. Kids are drawn to the presenters' mischief and squabbles...