Jeremy Clarkson has admitted he still hasn’t managed to win over his Cotswolds neighbours after setting up Diddly Squat Farm.
The former Top Gear star and Grand Tour host is launching season two of Clarkson’s Farm at Prime Video, a documentary about his efforts to get a working farm and associated farm shop off the ground in the Chipping Norton area.
But Clarkson has faced staunch opposition to his farm shop, which Chadlington locals have complained has drawn in far too much tourist traffic to the peaceful countryside from fans of the TV star.
Speaking about his current popularity locally, Clarkson said: “In a way, the village is divided. It’s difficult to say how many people support us in the village and how many don’t.
“Some of it, I’m sure, comes from my past, and driving quickly around corners while shouting, and they didn’t find that appealing.
“As far as the farm is concerned, it’s split pretty neatly between those who have a house number – you know, 22 Oak Avenue or 3 Grove or whatever – who tend to support us, because we bring business to the area and jobs for their kids. Some of them are more than happy to go have a nice pint with a lovely view just up the road. So that works.
“If they’ve got a house name, they tend not to like us, because they tend to have moved here from London quite recently, and they don’t want crowds of people coming to the farm shop, so that seems to me to be the split. That’s about as tightly as I can put it.”
Clarkson held a meeting for locals to try to smooth over relations, but said it didn’t work on all of them.
He said of the meeting: “I can assure you, the people who spoke early on, I have emphatically not won them over. I lost them years ago. The ones who spoke first were the ones who really wanted to get it off their chest.
“But I think the room had plenty of people in there who were alright with me. One guy said, ‘I’ve lived in this village for 50 years. There are jobs for my kids [now]. My house is worth more. I can go up there and have a lovely pint and look at that view. It’s the best thing that’s happened to this area for the 50 years since I’ve lived here.’
“So, there’s that attitude. They’re very happy. And to be brutally honest, the farm shop is over a mile from the village so it’s of no consequence, really, to the people who actually hate me, and hate the farm shop, and hate the popularity.”
It has recently been reported that Amazon will part ways with Clarkson after the already-commissioned coming seasons of Clarkson’s Farm and The Grand Tour.
There was some speculation that it had been prompted by his controversial Sun column where he wrote that he “hated” Meghan Markle, although other reports claim it is because the shows are too expensive to make.
