New vrooms!
Meet the young petrolheads who are jumpstarting the biggest motoring show in the world
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- Emma Cox
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Imagine you’re the producer of the world’s biggest TV car show and your hosts – Jeremy Clarkson, Richard Hammond and James May – have stepped down. How do you find their replacements?
According to Francis Bourgeois, a trainspotter with a huge TikTok following who this week takes over the wheel of Prime Video’s The Grand Tour withco-hosts Thomas Holland and James Engelsman (the men behind hit YouTube car channel, Throttle House), you audition motoring enthusiasts by making them drive through an obstacle course, while wearing stilettoes.
“I wore high heels while reversing a trailer into a bay, trying not to knock eggs off cones,” says Bourgeois. “It was about putting us in tricky situations and seeing how we worked together. I was trying to show off my best form, but what shone through was that we were having a brilliant time, and that’s what ultimately got us cast.”
The new series sees Bourgeois, 26, and his co-hosts (39 and 34 respectively) take on a series of challenges, from racing cars against fighter jets in the Californian desert to street racing in Angola.
Bourgeois’s enthusiasm for cars is less well known than his love of trains but every bit as sincere: as a small boy he would carry a notebook and fill it with the names of cars he saw, which gave him the knowledge that impressed producers.
Jeremy Clarkson, James May and Richard Hammond. Prime Video
“We were shown images of car parts – a panel, the rear quarter, a wheel – and had to say what car it was. I nailed that,” he says of those auditions. “It showed my car enthusiasm is as deeply wired as my railway enthusiasm. We’re not doing this because it’s a good gig, we’re doing it because we love cars.”
The job is a dream come true for Bourgeois: but it’s not something he strived for. His career has been something of a happy accident. He grew up near Willesden in north west London, a busy train junction: “We went everywhere by train and I loved it. I was glued to the windows – occasionally licking them,” he jokes. At secondary school, he decided that talking about his hobby would be “social suicide” and tried to fit in by wearing cool clothes and gelling his hair.
Studying mechanical engineering at Nottingham University, he had an existential crisis about who he really was: “Everyone tries to find their footing as a teenager. Being around such diversity at university, seeing people owning their identity, affected me. I was trying to hold on to this cool, curated version of myself, but it felt impossible.”
We’re not doing this because it’s a good gig, but because we love cars
Francis Bourgeois
Bourgeois – who had an internship at Rolls-Royce – began being more open about his passion with friends and, during lockdown, started making train videos with his brother. His TikTok channel went viral, touching fans who loved his unashamed nerdiness. “There are many people who feel that sense of social conformity,” he says. “I wish for anyone who feels the need to hide something to embrace it, because owning your quirks is ultimately the coolest thing.”
When he began his TikTok career, Bourgeois ditched his birth name, Luke Nicolson, after being told employers might trawl through his social media. The pseudonym, inspired in part by artist Louise Bourgeois, meant he could be “as creatively explosive as I liked”. It also offered him a “level of protection” against the “overwhelming” feeling of having his name shouted in the street.
So, with The Grand Tour about to launch globally, how does Bourgeois – who lives with girlfriend Amy Linkin-Chandler in London – feel about losing his anonymity altogether?
“I’ll still get the train everywhere,” he says. “I’ll still go to the John Lewis café and feed crows with Amy. I’m very grateful for what’s about to happen, but I don’t anticipate changing my day-to-day life.”
Full throttle
YouTube car stars Thomas Holland and James Engelsman on making the gear change to TV… and becoming a threesome
Francis Bourgeois, Thomas Holland and James Engelsman on The Grand Tour. Prime Video
For those who don’t know your work, what’s Throttle House all about?
Thomas Car journalism is at the core, but we have a particular philosophy: cars are supposed to be fun, so our goal has always been to capture what it’s like to drive cool cars in cool places.
James We grew up watching Top Gear and Fifth Gear, and
hat ability to live vicariously through the person in the driver’s seat is powerful.
Were you nervous about accepting the Grand Tour job?
Thomas You do think, “This is a huge decision”, but it kept evolving without us having a chance to think it through. It started to feel right, so we just went with it.
James We have a small, close-knit team, so we were worried about going up to “big school”, but everyone was really nice.
At what point did you know Francis would join you?
Thomas We were passengers in the casting process, but it was immediately clear Francis was the right fit. When he came in, it just clicked – no hesitation. He probably knows more about cars than us, which is upsetting.
Were you worried about working with a new person?
Thomas James I and were worried, when we were testing with other people, that there wasn’t a gap between us for another presenter.
James But there was – it was just Francis-shaped, as it turns out.
Is it a big change to go from YouTube to The Grand Tour?
Thomas We already make a reasonably high-production show, so it was more of the same, just scaled up.
James It’s like going from building an elaborate sandcastle to building a house.
Fans of the show have always enjoyed the mishaps. Are they still there?
Thomas There’s no way of taking cars around the world into places they don’t belong without a few breakdowns, physically and metaphorically.
The previous hosts make a cameo...
Thomas They’re exactly who you’d think they are!
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James They felt like the three ghosts from A Christmas Carol. I’ll let you guess which one’s which.
Authors
Emma Cox
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