My life through a lens
Celebrities share the stories behind their favourite photos. This week it’s TV presenter and journalist James May, 57
1975 I’m pretty sure my father James cut my hair for this.
Dad ran steel foundries, so we moved around a bit.
I was a church choirboy in Yorkshire and the choirmaster taught me the piano and flute. I learnt the harpsichord when I read music at Lancaster University.
I thought it would make me seem deep, interesting and appealing to girls.
1990 This was when I was presenting Driven, Channel 4’s rival to Top Gear. One of my early jobs was on Autocar magazine. I edited its Road Test Yearbook – a précis of the 101 cars we’d tested that year. I re-edited the copy so the drop caps at the start of each review spelt out a message about being bored and finding the whole thing a pain. I was fired.
2006I I don’t know why I look grumpy here because loved Oz And James’s Big Wine Adventure. For this series Oz Clarke and I travelled through France’s wine regions while he tried to convert me to wine. All I had to do was drink and make facile comments but poor Oz had to brush up on every region and winemaker. He’s great company and I still see him. He’s serious, learned and sophisticated. He’s much posher and rounded than me and we had lots of drunken philosophical discussions.
2007 Flying in this 1930s Tiger Moth biplane for James May’s 20th Century was a dream come true because I’ve been interested in planes since I was a boy. I never imagined I’d learn to fly, because it’s expensive and complicated, but I was driving past an airfield with a mate and saw a sign advertising introductory flying lessons. I booked a 20-minute lesson and just kept going. I eventually got a pilot’s licence. I’ve now owned four planes and my current one is an American Champion Scout.
2012 Here I am with Tom Cruise and The Stig at the world premiere of Jack Reacher in London’s Leicester Square. This was a publicity stunt for Top Gear. Tom was a friend of the show, having competed with Cameron Diaz in Star In A Reasonably Priced Car in 2010. At the time, they topped the leaderboard. Tom is a nice bloke – modest, approachable and unstarry. He worked hard to put in a cracking time, he’s very competitive. I dread to think what he thought of the appalling state of our green room.
2013 This is me with [from left] Brian Cox Chris Evans and Gary Barlow after driving from Land’s End to John o’ Groats for Breast Cancer Awareness. When Chris took over on Top Gear, I don’t think he realised how difficult it would be. He’s a fantastic broadcaster, but people imagine the show’s formula is simple. It’s actually complicated and very fragile.
2014 I joined Top Gear in 1999 but was fired because they wanted more women. Jeremy and Richard had presented the revived 2002 show when they started looking for a third presenter. They tried everybody they could think of rather than have me. We’ve never understood the secret of our chemistry. We don’t know if viewers find us pitiable or sympathise with us. We have the glorious problem that three is a crowd. It’s true in life and very true in TV.
2020 My garage in the countryside has underfloor heating, TV and Wi-Fi but this one in London where I store my cars and motorcycles is a rough-and-ready bolthole which I call my zombie apocalypse bunker. We filmed some of my new driving theory test app here. I actually failed my first driving test on the emergency stop. To get me to brake, the examiner called out, ‘There’s a child in the road.’ But there wasn’t. So I said so.
Piers Morgan is away