Clarkson, Hammond and May dissolve production company

It comes ahead of the release of the final Grand Tour episode later this year.

Production Company Dissolution

Jeremy Clarkson, Richard Hammond and James May have dissolved their production company W. Chump and Sons as their time on screen together nears an end.

Official Decision

According to the Daily Mail, the decision was made on July 11th after appointing a voluntary liquidator and making a 'special resolution to wind up' the company which turned over around £6 million annually.

History of Collaboration

The trio have been working together for 21 years since creating a winning formula during Top Gear in the early noughties and have finished filming their final episode of the Grand Tour. The special will see them head to Zimbabwe and is set to be released later this year.

Top Gear Success

Their time on Top Gear from 2002 to 2015 saw the BBC show become one of the biggest hits on television, often getting 7 million UK viewers a week and, at one stage, around 350 million viewers worldwide. The show evolved from a basic weekly studio format to creating feature length specials around the world, continuing when the trio started the Grand Tour on Amazon Prime in 2016. Top Gear was eventually cancelled by the BBC last year after a major crash involving presenter Freddie Flintoff during filming in 2022.

Individual Projects

Now, each presenter is finding success on individual projects, none more so than Jeremy Clarkson with Clarkson’s Farm just having aired its third series, becoming one of the most watched shows on Amazon Prime. James May continues his world travels with his ‘Our Man in..’ series recently seeing him in Italy, while Richard Hammond has many ongoing projects, including The Smallest Cog restoration garage and the DriveTribe YouTube Channel.

words: Mike Booth
pictures: Amazon MGM Studios