As the new presenting team of Top Gear is assembled (after Jeremy Clarkson’s fracas about a steak – or lack of steak – got him sacked), people are wondering whether Jodie Kidd might make it into the final selection.
The former model has previous with the show, getting a 1.48 in the Star in a Reasonably Priced Car segment which propelled her towards the very top of the leaderboard. Above Gordon Ramsay and Jay Kay from Jamiroquai! She also has taken part in various Gumball 3000 rallies and she’s won various motor races.
Chris Evans – who will replace Jeremy at the helm – says there will be public auditions for co-host roles and that there will definitely be a female TV presenter on the show. But a BBC2 producer (a woman! very sisterly, that is) has said that there won’t be any 'gender diktats' with regards to presenters.
Well, besides the point that it's galling to see women work their way up in male-led industries then pull the ladder up behind them, why on earth shouldn’t Top Gear have a female presenter? Women can drive, women can present TV shows, Jodie’s a pretty good driver, and besides, an all-male line-up will inevitably draw comparisons with the previous incarnation and be criticised for not matching it in quality. At present, a female presenter would be such a curve-ball that people will be impressed, especially when the presenter is as qualified as Jodie.
As for all the ‘banter’ of Top Gear? Chris Evans will be a bit less fuddy duddy than Jeremy, and you can find the sort of repeated ‘oh you’re a bit of a weakling/hippie’ stuff Richard Hammond and James May would do to one another across any playground in the UK.
Plus, think of the goodwill the show could spread. Yes, Top Gear’s promotion of cars is leading towards the absolute end of the planet via climate change caused by fossil fuels. And Ed Sheeran almost crashed a few times when he was on the show (seriously, BBC producers could put an unlicensed driver on a racetrack in a car but couldn’t confirm a female presenter?)
But if Saudi Arabia and other religiously conservative countries where women are forbidden from driving could see shows featuring actual female drivers (Top Gear is immensely popular around the world), the show could do the previously unthinkable and plant the seed for social change around the world. It would surely be a nice resolution to the comment made by Newsnight presenter Kirsty Wark (herself, perhaps unfairly passed over in favour of Evan Davies to present the show full-time) that you'd sooner see women drive in Saudi Arabia than on Top Gear.
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This article originally appeared on The Debrief.