TV show quotes
[Jeremy Clarkson decides to try using explosives to speed up the demolition of one of the houses they've gone to demolish]
FIRE IN THE HOLE!
[The explosives are detonated, there is a lot of smoke and dust, but all that falls is the door of the house which is otherwise intact]
(a la Michael Caine) You only blown the bloody door off!
[During the opening sequence.]
Tonight, James asks a girl for a favour.
[slowly] No.
Richard listens to a man. And I polish a bishop.
[on The Stig]
Some say that his favourite T-shirt has a picture on the front of a T-shirt. And that he spent all week waiting for a big cheque from the Germans, because he too has spent the last 2,000 years sitting on his backside doing absolutely nothing at all. All we know is, he's called The Stig.
[while checking on the Peugeot iOn]
That's not a very big boot. You wouldn't get a dog in there. [brief pause after realizing what he just said] Discussing luggage space is like I'm back on old Top Gear.
Can I get a beard?
[voiceover] And what's more, the Leaf can even deliver your own personal Greenpeace lecture.
[short jingle]
It's talking! [looking visibly surprised while it speaks]
By the 12th of May, electric cars worldwide saved a total of 344,000 eco-trees.
What!?
And 659 tonnes of carbon-dioxide has been reduced.
What do they mean? What's an eco-tree? What are you saying woman?
These days eco-ism is seen as cool. People like James May and me, petrol heads, we're -- we're dinosaurs really. So if you have one of these cars with zero emission and full electric plastered down the side, you are more likely to get a girlfriend. [voiceover] You just have to hope she doesn't live at the other end of the country.
Use some of your charm. It will begin with the word "hello". Ready? [imitates James] "Hello."
Hello. We were just wondering, we're trying to... We've got two electric cars.
Right.
[camera cuts to Jeremy, who is a short distance away from James]
James has a way with women. I should imagine he'll be able to talk her into it, no problem at all.
[camera switches back to James]
..it's going to take 12 hours.
[slowly, after a long pause] ...No.
[while brass rubbing in the Lincoln Cathedral]
I would never normally be brass rubbing -- and do you know why I've never done it? 'Cause all the cars I've ever owned have been powered by petrol or diesel. Look [points to his rubbing], it's Hammond, only in a diving bell.
It does look a bit like Hammond, actually.
I have here a personal letter reply to us from David Cameron himself. [reading the letter] "Dear Top Gear, thank you for your letter. Whilst it's true I'm keen on us to build on our ties out here, sending you three is not quite what I had in mind. The Foreign Secretary did wonder instead about a fence mending trip to Mexico. Basically, my message is this... you do the cars, we'll do the diplomacy."
[looks behind] Oh, here he comes now.
[David Cameron is seen leaving Number 10 by car in front of the three]
Stay away from India.
[looking dejected] ...Well, that was unequivocal.
Well, we're going to ignore the Prime Minister. What we're going to do instead is to buy three second-hand British cars, and then to head over there with a very simple objective... to rescue Britain.
[voiceover] As night fell, we came across a village fete. Everyone was doing business, so I ramped up the PA.
[Music being played from Jeremy's loudspeaker]
The British are back... I mean here.
Has anyone here seen the theory test? Anybody?
Yeah.
You have? Because most people of our age haven't, and none of the questions have got anything to do, as far as I can work out with driving. Now let me - can I give you some examples? [looks briefly at Hammond] You can answer this. "An elderly person... [gestures to himself] An elderly person's ability could be affected because they may be unable to...?"
Eat toffees.
No.
Get an erection. [laughter]
[looks at Jeremy's jeans] Wear jeans! [laughter]
Funny. "Where's the safest place to park your vehicle at night?"
In a police station. [laughter]
Right, we've got a picture here. We'll bring up this picture. [screen shows school keep clear markings] Right. When - This is a real question, OK? "You must not stop on these road markings because you may obstruct... what?" [laughter]
Landing aircraft!
I mean, seriously, that is a question. He's managed to fail 92 times on that one.
Those are not questions to pass your driving. Do any of them say, for instance, can you drive a car?
No, no. I'm in the book now. This is what you buy your teenage child when they're learning to drive. "At an incident, a small child is not breathing. To restore normal breathing, you should breathe into their mouth, A sharply, B gently, C heavily, D tenderly?" [laughter]
It doesn't say "tenderly"!
I made "tenderly" up. Nothing to do with driving!
What I love about this, though, is it's called the Kubang, which, being a Maserati, is the noise it'll make the day the warranty runs out!
I bring all this up, OK, because when did it happen that somebody decided that driving was so unbelievably hard, you can't do it while doing something else? You know like listening to Ken Bruce's pop master, or talking on the phone. Honestly, I can't think of anything that I couldn't do while driving... apart from reading a broadsheet newspaper. I wouldn't be able to do that.
Sawing a piece of wood.
I could do that.
You can't, you'd need to hold your wood -- [making sawing movement]
No, no, you put it between your legs. You can still operate the pedals. You could saw.
Um, sewing on a button. You need both hands to really do this fiddly --
I could do that.
You could not!
I could!
You know you can't sew on a button with a hammer?
I know how to sew. Actually, while we're on the subject, did you see that case recently... a woman who was stopped by the police after they caught her driving down a motorway while... causing herself to have pleasure. [laughter]
I bet you can't drive in a sleeping bag. [laughter] Actually, I'm not sure. Actually, I'm going to take that back. I think you could drive in a sleeping bag if you, if you...
You couldn't drive in a sleeping bag.
I bet you - I bet I could.
You can't!
I bet I could drive in a sleeping bag.
Right, there you go. Right, you're on! Some time this week, before next week's show, I'll take you on round the track. You drive in a proper cocoon sleeping bag with your arms in it...
Yeah...
And race me, and I'll sew a button on my shirt.
Oh let me guess... I've got to drive whilst performing an act on myself.
[laughter and applause]
No.
It'd be a short race!
We'll leave you out of it.
Can we make it a 50 yard sprint -- [breaks down to laugh]
It's just suddenly hit me, that I'm driving across Italy in a supercar, and I've got another one to look at!
Oh, no, he's going on the phone. Oh, no. Oh, no...
[speaking Italian on his phone]
Well, that's that, then.
These quotes come from Wikiquote's Top Gear pages and are available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License.
