Jeremy Clarkson and Lisa Hogan share the realities of working together on Clarkson’s Farm and those ‘disastrous’ filming moments
The adventure has led to situations including Jeremy attempting to help out during lambing season, driving a Lamborghini tractor that seems like it can’t quite fit anywhere, and for Lisa, running the Diddly Squat Farm shop. For much of the show, Lisa is as much behind the camera as she is in front, while filming her partner’s attempts to become a dab hand as a farmer.
Spotlight cover, the pair have opened up about pulling together to make the farm a success, their favourite thing about the countryside, and how the simple life has changed them both…
First things first. Jeremy, what made you want to run a farm?
Jeremy: I’ve actually lived on the farm for many years, we had it for all sorts of inheritance tax reasons, but I was very busy with writing newspaper columns, there was Top Gear to start with and then latterly The Grand Tour, as well as other projects and shows. The farm made no money, it didn’t cost any money, it was just a nice thing to have. It was run by a chap from the village who was a farmer, and then when he was retiring, I suddenly thought, ‘I can do that.’
Diddly Squat Farm is such a great name. How did you choose it?
Lisa: It was called Diddly Squat Farm previously because that’s how much it made! We thought it worked well and wanted to keep it. We played around with another couple of names, but everyone’s eyes seemed to light up when you told them it was called Diddly Squat Farm.
How was it having Jeremy at home and working on the show together?
L: Next question! [Laughs]. I’m joking! You know what, it took a little bit of time to settle into. We were both a bit anxious, but we got into a routine pretty quickly.
It probably took a few weeks of saying, ‘Look, we’re here now,’ so I did think that that would be part of the challenge. It’s always nice to look forward to someone coming home, but there was none of that, not even for a day! But we did get on pretty well, we do get on well, we’re both quite feisty!
And how was it working with Lisa, Jeremy?
J: She does work her socks off, she’s there in the shop now. I think she’s really enjoying doing that, because she’s even less of a country girl than I am – though she’ll probably say different. She was born in Dublin and has lived in Switzerland, Majorca, and London … and yet there she is with her filthy Doc Martens on, stomping around, running that farm shop and loving it.
Did the two of you have any doubts when committing to making the farm work?
J: Literally everybody told me not to do it! Because farming is a vocation. You either need to be born into it or you need to go to agricultural college and learn how to do it. You can’t just say, ‘I’m going to do farming.’ I think John Humphrys tried to do farming – it lasted a year, and by his own admission he hated it, couldn’t do it and it was too difficult – it is phenomenally difficult!
I do plenty of home videos and Jeremy was pretty good at saying, ‘Do it from this angle, this angle,’ so it was just about getting as much as I could. With lambing, I was on my knees getting up close and personal, so it was quite instinctive! But it was quite wobbly, you can certainly see when the wobble cam comes in!
Disastrous moments? Tell us more…
J: Where to begin… We were very lucky in a sense because if nothing had happened you’d end up with a quite a boring programme.