Drink driving, frozen penis gets Top Gear team in trouble
2:12PM Thursday July 03, 2008
Top Gear presenters Jeremy Clarkson and James May while filming the Polar Special. Photo / BBC
An icy Top Gear episode showing hosts Jeremy Clarkson and James May drinking and driving has landed the pair in hot water.
The Polar Special, which screened in the UK last year and in New Zealand last month, featured the two drinking gin and tonics while trying to reach the Magnetic North Pole.
The BBC Trust was bombarded with viewer complaints about the episode, which also screened an image of a frostbitten penis.
BBC Trust criticised the show, saying it "could be seen to glamorise the misuse of alcohol".
BBC reports that the show's executive producer defended the pair's behaviour, saying that they were beyond the jurisdiction of drink drive laws, and were actually in international waters at the time.
The trust accepted that neither presenter was drunk or out of control of the vehicle, but said it was "not editorially justified in the context of a family show" at the time it screened.
In relation to the image of frostbitten genitalia, a statement from the trust said there was "a clear editorial purpose for the inclusion of an image of a frostbitten penis, which had been shown for a medical rather than a sexual purpose".
- NZ HERALD STAFF
No comments:
Post a Comment