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ingek73 · 4 years ago

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Exiting the vampires' palace: The tabloids are angry because Harry revealed how it works

You're not meant to explain how the gossip gets made.

Mic Wright

7 hr ago

The British Royal Family, the Captain Renault in Casablanca of repressed and repressive families, is shocked! shocked! to find out that bad parenting was going on in there. Prince Harry’s decision to talk about parenting — his experience of it and approach to it — on the Armchair Expert podcast has sent the firm and its frenemies in the tabloid press into a frenzy.

But the real issue is not that Harry discussed his relationship with his father or the fact that coldness permeates the parenting style of the royal family from top to bottom, it’s that he continues to unpick the devil’s bargain between the monarchy and tabloid press. It’s a deal that’s epitomised by the headline and sub-deck over pictures of William and Kate in yesterday’s Daily Mail:

Here’s how to do it, Harry!

William and Kate get stuck in with a day of play — and pets — for Mental Health Awareness Week…

On the previous page, the paper castigates Harry for choosing to “broadcast his pain again”. So there’s how you do it to get the approval of the tabloid press:

Don’t actually talk about mental health issues, just goon around for the cameras and make sure you tolerate The Mail on Sunday publishing creepy calendars full of pictures of your children. That’s the deal.

[Twitter avatar for @arusbridger

alan rusbridger

@arusbridger

Sometimes, when Prince Harry says sensible things (eg this morning about parenting), it would be nice if journalists discussed what he said rather than whether he has pissed off the Royals or Meghan put him up to it

May 14th 2021

866 Retweets6,723 Likes]

The quote that’s really angered the newspapers is not one you see plastered in the headlines or dropped into huge pull quotes. It’s the moment early on in the Armchair Expert episode when Harry says:

I used to be fearful of it. Now, it’s almost like the same groups of people that come at it so negatively or try to turn it against you or weaponise it, and therefore prevent so many millions of people from doing so, actually encourages me to speak out more… I’m going to be vulnerable, if I get attacked for it, let’s see who’s actually attacking me and what’s their story? What’s their agenda? Who do they work for?

The tabloids — and I do include The Daily Mail among their number — are particularly aggrieved because Harry is refuting their claim that he was ‘turned’ against them and the monarchy by Meghan. He says he wanted out long before he met her and that the British press was a huge cause of that:

It’s the job, right? Grin and bear it. Get on with it. I was in my early twenties and I was thinking, ‘I don’t want this job. I don’t want to be here. I don’t want to be doing this. Look what it did to my mum. How am I ever going to settle down and have a wife and family, when I know it’s going to happen again?’ I’ve seen behind the curtain, I’ve seen the business model, and seen how this whole thing works and I don’t want to be a part of this.

It’s those words that are driving the tabloids even more deranged than usual. The business of celebrity gossip — and royal reporting is just celebrity gossip about one family — requires the people playing the game to pretend there is no game.

In the most privileged professional wrestling ever, Prince Harry has broken kayfabe; he is consistently choosing to tell the story behind the story, to point at the paparazzi, the columnists, the palace flunkies, and the press barons and say, “Who are they working for? And what is their agenda?”

It’s one of the things a prince is categorically not allowed to do.

That’s why a softly spoken line about how he’s trying to be a different kind of parent than his own parents and grandparents becomes “a broadside”, “a bitter attack” and “a parenting bombshell” in the hands of the tabloids.

[Twitter avatar for @nazirafzal

nazir afzal

@nazirafzal

Having listened to Prince Harry on @ArmchairExpPod I urge you to ignore the faux Royalists (some might say Racists) who want to criticise him & through him their real target, Meghan

This is a man comfortable taking about mental health, masculinity & parenting

Essential listening Image

May 14th 2021

352 Retweets1,799 Likes]

Just look at how Harry’s words were trailed in yesterday’s Daily Mail:

Prince Harry yesterday launched another broadside at the Royal Family in which he appeared to suggest both his father and the Queen failed as parents.

But what did Prince Harry actually say? Well, substantial quotes — even then partial and cherry-picked — didn’t feature on the front page of the paper. You had to go digging inside to find them. Harry said:

“Isn’t life about breaking the cycle? there’s no blame. I don’t think we should be pointing the finger or blaming anybody. But…when it comes to parenting, I’ve experienced some form of pain or suffering because of the pain or suffering that perhaps my father or my parents had suffered…

… For me it comes down to awareness like I never, I never saw it, I never knew about it, and then suddenly I started to piece it all together and go, okay, so this is where he went to school, this is what happened, I know this bit about his life. I also know that’s connected to his parents, so that means that he’s treating me this way that he was treated which means, how can I change that for my own kids? And, well, here I am.”

It hardly reads as a broadside or a condemnation of his parents or grandparents. It comes across even less like that if you listen to the podcast to hear the tone of Harry’s words and place them within the context of the conversation. But context isn’t king for the tabloids, it’s not even allowed into the palace. Context lives out the back, milks the cows, and waits for a regime change.

In 1994, when Prince Charles was 46, 10 years old than Prince Harry is now, he spoke to Jonathan Dimbleby for an authorised biography and a notorious documentary. As The Independent reported at the time:

It is abundantly clear that Prince Charles did not feel the affect of a loving father and mother, and that he considers his parents, in the words of the child psychologist Bruno Bettelheim, to have been not 'good enough'.

Dimbleby, with Prince Charles's approval, accuses the Queen of being physically and emotionally distant. But his deepest anger is reserved for the Duke of Edinburgh, who is described as 'harsh', 'hectoring' and deeply irked by his son's solemn and over-sensitive nature.

Prince Charles blames his father for sending him to Gordonstoun, the Scottish public school, where he was beaten up, bullied and abused, and he accuses Prince Philip of forcing him into marriage with a woman he scarcely knew and never loved.

But with Prince Philip now dead, the Queen in her final years, and Prince Charles set to succeed her as King Charles, all that stuff is meant to be stuffed back into the wardrobe. The story is that Harry and Meghan are bad and William and Kate are good and anything that complicates that picture is ignored.

[Twitter avatar for @KaindeB

Resilient

@KaindeB

@brokenbottleboy This is Penny talking about Philip bullying Charles. 😳 Image

May 14th 2021

5 Retweets16 Likes]

So instead we get stories about how shocking! Prince Harry’s mild comments actually are and outraged stories from places like The Sun about swearing:

TURN THE HEIR BLUE

Prince Harry SWEARS on podcast as he asks Dax Shepard about ‘s*** load of drugs’ and ‘getting s*** done’

Yes, The Sun that leers over women daily and writes lasciviously about “romps” is too chickens*** to write the word “shit” out in full and pretends that the Royal Family themselves don’t swear like navvies when they’re in private.

Meanwhile, in The Daily Telegraph, Royal Family sources — the same family who forced Prince Harry to walk in public beside his mother’s coffin when he was just 12, remember — decry him for his “woeful lack of compassion”. And, of course, the issue of swearing is brought up:

And aside from the highly personal content, royal sources suggested that the family was disappointed by the foul language used during the expletive-strewn 90-minute interview.

There’s nothing but compassion in the interview, but focusing on the ‘rude’ words and implying criticisms that simply aren’t there is just part of the tabloid game. They are livid with Prince Harry for making it clear that the dirty deal with the press was a huge part of what made him leave.

It’s not that Prince Harry is talking that so angers the tabloids, but that he is talking about them and the things they do; that one of his examples of times he felt helpless is being in a car with his mother and being chased by paparazzi. Royals saying quotable things is part of “the business model” but royals talking frankly about the poisonous role of the British press in public life is not.

[Twitter avatar for @Jasamgurlie

BLACKLIVESMATTER

@Jasamgurlie

Yep, Meghan, The Duchess Of Sussex made him say it all. 😂

The way I can keep pulling out these clips… Image

May 14th 2021

71 Retweets304 Likes]

Sarah Vine, deploying the industrial-strength feigned ignorance which is one of her great superpowers as a columnist, wrote in The Daily Mail yesterday:

It’s clear now that Harry is someone who, for whatever reason, has come to loathe the very fabric of royal life and managed to convince himself, for all the privilege and status afforded him, his upbringing was a prolonged torture. And that is very sad and destructive…

… Far from exorcising his demons, Harry’s newfound freedom seems only to be feeding the monsters. He talks about his shoulders dropping and a weight lifting since he moved to America; but all the evidence seems to point to him becoming more, not less, unhappy.

As ever, it’s The Daily Mail delighting in gaslighting and a partial retelling of the facts, cutting itself and its rivals from the frame. What could possibly have made Prince Harry feel he was trapped in a golden cage? The media looks around and conveniently spies no mirrors. And, even if it was a cage, Sarah Vine argues, this songbird should have been grateful for the accommodation.

Curiously Vine and The Mail don’t include the section about it taking pictures of people’s children or when Prince Harry says…

…because of the way the UK media are they feel an ownership over you. Literally, a full-on ownership, and then they give an impression to… most of their readers that that is the case.

… your saying that the moment we step out of our house that it’s open season and free game, what because of public interest? There’s no public interest in you taking your kids for a walk down the beach.

… it’s this rabid feeding frenzy.

[Twitter avatar for @MsAlishia83

Alishia A

@MsAlishia83

Help me to understand why some of you all act like Prince Harry broke up with you personally.

May 13th 2021

309 Retweets2,793 Likes]

I’m a republican — I don’t believe the UK should have a monarchy at all — so I don’t believe the golden cage should exist. But while it does, the tabloids benefit from it and they cannot allow anyone to get away with disparaging the system. They exist not to criticise it but to defend it and feed on it.

Prince Harry cannot ‘be normal’ now or simply shut up because even if he did, the tabloid press would not respect that silence. They would tell their own stories of why he wasn’t speaking, filling the void with fictions and half-truths. In talking about parenting and pain — even from the extraordinarily unusual situation he finds himself in — Harry will help others.

And while he’s a little too fond of Californian therapy speak, the fact that he’s talking about how we can parent differently to the way our parents or grandparents did it is an unquestionably good thing.

If you only read his words pushed through the prism of the tabloid press, you’ll think he was ranting and raving about his families failings but actually, he’s saying — he knows they did their best but he wants to do better for his own children. In the abnormal world of the royals, that’s one of the most normal things anyone has said in ages…

#prince harry #duke of sussex #meghan markle #brokenbottleboy #tabloids #prince charles #royal reporters

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estherroberts · 7 years ago

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and nothing ever does begin like nothing ever ends

chapter one: war

fandom: ars paradoxica, his dark materials

words: 1508

rating: T

characters: anthony partridge, penny wise, patty fitzroy, chet whickman

read on ao3

series masterpost

October 15, 1941

“fuck.” anthony looks down at his work, looks up at astoria. “jesus jumping jacks on a jester, fuck, astoria, look at this!”

the quail hops her way over to peer down at the lines and lines of equations that cover anthony’s desk. “holy ballsack.”

“my sentiments exactly.”

“that’s the entire continent right there, isn’t it.”

“if— if the german electorate got nippon to attack hispania nova, everyone has to jump in. that’s what an alliance means.”

“fucking shit on a pancake. the LAST war started because everyone had to be so honorable and now look, so much for learning from history.”

anthony sighs. he’s tempted to crumple up all his work and throw it into the trash with the might of a thousand suns. he knows new denmark doesn’t want to be involved in another european war, he knows no one will listen to anything he says when the continentalist mentality runs so strong here. “we gotta tell someone.”

“no. we can’t. we can’t we can’t we can’t, anthony, we’ll get fired, we’ll, we’ll be the boy who cried wolf, the laughing stock of the town. we can’t say it. what if it’s wrong? what if we’re wrong?” she flutters her wings and hops around the desk.

“it’s. not.”

astoria stops moving and looks back at anthony. “i know. that’s why it’s so scary.”

he picks her up and brings her to his chest, kissing her head. “the magisterium has been getting away with some truly horrible things over in europe. if they’re gonna bring the war to us, we should be prepared for it. and we should make sure the other countries are too.”

“it shouldn’t be just us, though.”

“i know. but we figured it out. so we have to tell the world. or at least one guy in a position of power and influence.”

“fine.”

December 8, 1941

“an attack on our allies is an attack on us! an attack. on our allies. is an attack. on us. when the nippons dive bombed san diego, they dive bombed an entire continental allyship. citizens of this nation, the entire republic of texas, we are at war, alongside our sister nations, because we cannot let hispania nova face the terrors of battle alone."

penny finishes cleaning the counter and glances over at the radio. her only customers are two older men, one with a greyhound daemon and one with a goose. they are debating the radio broadcast, and she's listening intently, though she busies herself with rolling silverware into napkin bundles.

"well, he's not wrong, we did swear we'd go to war for any of the continental countries."

"it's just, our president wouldn't bring us into this war if we couldn't profit from it, y’know? so i'm trying to figure out what's in it for us." the one with the hound leans forward in his seat, his daemon perking up her ears.

"hispania nova gets men, money, and weapons. we get zilch. then, when the war's over, they owe us a shitton.”

"yeah but the other countries are jumpin’ in, they're gonna be a helluva lot of debt after this."

"the only reason they can fight back is because they have the might of four other nations to back them the fuck up—“ the one with the goose daemon turns to penny. "apologies."

she waves them off, but brings her bucket of silverware to the back of the restaurant. “dax?”

fiodaxion, her black and blue butterfly daemon, flicks one of his antenna on her ear. “penny?”

“wanna join the army?”

he laughs nervously, almost like he can’t tell if she’s joking.

“seriously.” she unloads the rolled silverware into a larger basket filled with more of the same. “all the fighting, all the glory…”

“we can’t,” dax sighs and flicks his tongue out at her.

“why, cuz i’m a girl? how backwards of you.”

“i mean… do you think they would really let us? and what about the pay?”

“probably not as good as restaurant tips. plus they might throw me in a bomb factory, and i just can’t see myself doing well there.”

“right.” he flutters around the room and pushes to the limits of their range to check on their customers. “need anything boys?”

“nope!”

“no, thank you!”

dax flies back and gives penny what she knows to be his disappointed look. “i bet miles jones is going to enlist.”

“ugh. fuck that guy.” penny bounces up and down on her toes and reaches out her finger for her daemon to land on. “i guess we can see what war effort stuff we can do from home?”

“i guess.”

“and if they open the draft to girls?��

“then we can join.”

September 20, 1941

patty, decked out in faux fur, gold jewelry, and long manicured nails, dunks a calamari into the sauce in front of her. while she’s chewing, she looks over to her daemon and addresses them. “so yesterday i was out with some of the girls, and they introduced this new lady, right? and she was asking about you and so i said, 'they’re at home, no big deal,' and she was like, 'what, do you have more than one daemon? and how are you so far away?'” she pops another piece into her mouth and continues, “and i was like, ‘well, i’m not a witch or anything but we have a really big range,’ of course, cuz you know we were at the cafe just next door, and she was like, ‘ohh, well i guess that makes sense, what does he look like?’ and i rolled my eyes, and i was like, ‘maria’s a fucking underwater volcanic tube worm! they don’t have a fucking gender! what the fuck is wrong with you?’ and she was, of course, really upset because how could she know that people have plant daemons and fuck me backwards, but god, you’re not even a plant, right?”

I DON’T KNOW IF I’M A PLANT. I THINK MOST BODILY FUNCTIONS OF A TUBE WORM ARE CONTROLLED BY BACTERIA. ANYWAY, SHE SOUNDS LIKE A BITCH.

“i’m bringing you with me next time.” she narrows her eyes at the gigantic heated tank. “even if it is a pain in the ass.”

ARE YOU CALLING ME A PAIN IN THE ASS?

“oh, never, darling, i wouldn’t dream of it. just transporting you is tricky, and people get a little freaked out when you,” she taps her head, “y’know, talk.”

OH, FOR FUCK’S SAKE, PATTY.

she glances at the clock on the wall and flicks on the radio. “time to tune into to whatever fresh hell the magisterium is responsible for today.”

I DON’T REALLY WANT TO LISTEN TODAY. WHAT IF ANOTHER COUNTRY GOT INVADED?

“it’s life, maria. it’s our job to know what they’re doing over there. and maybe figure out someway to help.” patty kicks her feet onto the table and finishes the last of her calamari. “ooh! maybe we could find a husband and get into some secret government shit!”

YOU REALLY THINK IT’S THAT EASY? a thousand bubbles rapidly fly to the top of the tank. HOW DO YOU KNOW YOU’LL MARRY SOMEONE WHO WORKS FOR THE GOVERNMENT? OR THAT HIS JOB WILL BE SECRET? HOW DO YOU COME UP WITH THIS SHIT?

she shrugs. “i have a couple of avenues to explore.”

WERE YOU READING GEORGE FITZROY'S MAIL AGAIN?

“maybe.”

October 28, 1943

“and until that day, we stand guard. we are determined that their plan for world conquest shall stop, here and now. we are determined that they shall never again use peaceful industries for warlike purposes. we are determined that the vicious magisterium cycle of: war, phony peace, war, phony peace, war, phony peace, shall once and for all time, come to an end. that is your job in the war against the german electorate.”

as the projector clicks off, chet turns to arethusa and rolls his eyes. “i think i’d rather sit in an anbaric chair than hear the phrase ‘phony peace’ again.”

“hey now. you signed up to defend this country.” the german shepard gets up, walks in a circle, and settles again at his feet. “least you could do is sit through a good ole fashioned motivational picture show.”

“they need better writers.”

anderson, on the bench next to him, nods and chuckles. “it’s really not us they need to worry about. we’re already here to fight.”

“fight— or swab the deck another thirty-two times.”

chet’s fellow sailor nods again and gets up, his seagull daemon stretching her wings. “speaking of which…”

“see ya.”

arethusa rests her head on chet’s knee. “don’t be so negative. project rainbow starts tomorrow.”

“ah yes, the mysterious project of which no one on the ship is allowed to know anything about and in which we must all take part.”

she tilts her head from side to side and he sighs.

“i’m kidding, thuse, i’m really looking forward to it. i’m hoping we can find out a little bit more about it.

“me too.”

#ars paradoxica #his dark materials #ars hdm crossover

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perksofwifi · 5 years ago

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Top Gear America Host Rob Corddry’s Car Guy Credentials

Top Gear America host Rob Corddry may be best known for his comedy and acting, but his car enthusiasm runs far beyond driving the latest exotics on the HBO hit show Ballers.

“In my experiences with cars at a young age,” Corddry said, “I made a choice to not get all bogged down in the details. And just get psyched about cars, in general. And yeah, I kind of know the different sizes of engines and I understand why, but I don’t bug myself with that. I’m not getting bogged down in it. I guess I kind of know what a Positraction differential is, but don’t test me on it.”

He may not be a walking automotive encyclopedia, but it doesn’t stop him from drooling over cars and talking about them any chance he gets.

“I’m so glad that I’ve talked about cars in enough interviews that the Top Gear America producers, I assume, they picked that up,” Corddry said. “I also did a couple car-based little video pieces with some journalists. And so, they’re not, it’s definitely not, they’re kind of deep cuts, I think, in terms of interviews. But you know, these guys have their ears out for that kind of thing.”

But Corddry believes he speaks for Everyman, whose dream job would be to work for Top Gear.

“I was a big fan of Top Gear, the original,” he added. “And I said, ‘Look, I’m not that guy (on the show). I’m none of those guys. I’m an enthusiast. I’m, if anything else, the audience.’ You know what I mean? And they were like, ‘That’s perfect. That’s all we want.’

“What I love about the original is the interaction between the three hosts. The audience, they like cars, but also, they’re there to see the interaction. They’re there to see us smile and get all excited. And drive, and potentially embarrass ourselves.”

He may sell himself short for a laugh, but Corddry is no stranger to both good and bad cars, having owned plenty of each.

“It’s not even worth talking about those cars,” he said. We kept pushing, though, because cars that bad always have stories. He eventually relented.

“A 1975 Ford Pinto wagon that didn’t have any floorboards. But it had the fake wood paneling,” he begins. “A yellow Honda Civic hatchback, I taught myself how to drive a stick on that one. So there was the value, there. I had a 1970 mid-year Ford Falcon. And it was kind of a piece of shit. It wasn’t like, when you think of a Ford Falcon, you’re like, ‘Oh, it’s great.’ It was a grandma car. It was my grandmother’s car, and it continued to be my grandmother’s car.”

These days, he’s far more interested in the cars he drove on TV than the classics, good or bad.

“You know, I was on Ballers, and I got to drive some pretty awesome cars on that show. And one of them was that stupid electric BMW i8. Which, actually, I don’t think I wish I could buy that, but I would love a Shelby. I would like to buy an M2, because I just want to know what all the fuss is about that. And I drove a 12-cylinder Aston Martin DBS Superleggera. That car’s insane. I mean it’s like, it’s way too heavy to drive, but it’s fun. It’s super fun, and beautiful. So there’s that.”

Although he’s a bit undecided on new cars to buy, he does have his eye on a particular classic.

“An ��87 Grand National GNX is my dream car, but I am in the market right now for a, probably ’86 or ’87, Buick Regal T-Type. Because, largely because of Dax [Shepard], he was like, ‘You shouldn’t get a Grand National. You should get a T-Type.’”

While he searches for his dream classic, he’s happy with his daily driver.

“I drive a Porsche, it’s a 2018 Porsche 911 [Carrera] S, which is my favorite car, ever.”

View this post on Instagram

Ever pinch yourself because you must be dreaming and it turns out to be real but you realize you were dozing off a little AND YOU’RE DRIVING?! Then you tell yourself that you shouldn’t drive for long stretches but remember the reason you pinched yourself and forget everything else? This is like that… MOTORTREND has announced the all-new Top Gear America hosts: Dax Shepard, Rob Corddry, and Jethro Bovingdon! Streaming Spring 2020 exclusively on MotorTrend. Subscribe now ????http://bit.ly/2qEFn3Z #TopGearAmerica #MotorTrend

A post shared by Rob Corddry (@rob_corddry) on Dec 3, 2019 at 4:28pm PST

His garage may be getting significantly fuller, now that he’s on Top Gear America with Dax Shepard—at least if his kids have any say in it. It seems as though working with Dax is more impressive than getting the TGA gig in the first place.

“It’s my kids that are more excited,” he said. “When they found out, they knew who Dax was, but that all of a sudden he’s married to Kristen Bell? Well, that changed everything for them. Now I’m sure they want me to buy like 10 cars, whereas before they were like, ‘I hate your Porsche.’ You know? And so they’re like, ‘Oh, just tell Dax to give her a message.’ And I’m like, ‘Uh, I don’t know if we’re going to do that yet, but we’ll see.’”

Whether it impresses Corddry’s kids or not, Top Gear America will debut in the Spring of 2020 starring Corddry, Dax Shepard, and Jethro Bovingdon—and it’ll be available exclusively on the MotorTrend app.

Stream TOP GEAR AMERICA starting Spring 2020 on the MotorTrend App. In the meantime, subscribe now to get the deal of the year.

The post Top Gear America Host Rob Corddry’s Car Guy Credentials appeared first on MotorTrend.

https://www.motortrend.com/news/top-gear-america-host-rob-corddrys-car-guy-credentials/ visto antes em https://www.motortrend.com

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perksofwifi · 5 years ago

Text

Top Gear America Host Dax Shepard’s Car Guy Credentials

Top Gear America host Dax Shepard’s car love is no secret. He was just recently on Conan talking about his 700-horsepower Buick Roadmaster station wagon, and he’s appeared in MotorTrend previously showing off his garage. There’s much more to Shepard’s car obsession than what he owns, though.

“I’m in to all cars,” Shepard told us. “I can’t think of a … Well that’s not true. I’m not dying to drive something pre-’40s, but I like most everything you put gas in. I’m super into motorcycles. I’m really into off-road and I like classic cars; I think I have an eclectic taste in classic cars. I generally like when people take a car that no one else recognized as cool and then make it cool.”

This is a key tenet of Shepard’s car philosophy: Nothing is sacred. Anything can be improved in performance, appearance, and comfort. As his restomod ’67 Lincoln Continental sedan demonstrates, he has no issue tearing up a classic to build something cool.

“I do not revere numbers-matching, or original paint, or any of that shit,” Shepard said. “I have lots of favorite movies from the ’80s, but I don’t watch them on a 17-inch Zenith TV. I watch them on a 78-inch TV. Even though they’re still my favorite, I want it to be the best that it can be. So I want cars to stop and accelerate and turn. I’m not a purist by any stretch. I would probably gut any car.”

The Continental is no doubt the most famous example, having starred in his 2012 film Hit and Run. Its old MEL 462-cubic-inch V-8 is long gone, replaced with a 700-hp fuel-injected Ford Racing crate motor, which laid plenty of rubber in our parking lot as he left the building. Big wheels, coil-over suspension, and Wilwood brakes round out the build.

His life growing up in Michigan didn’t start with 700-hp cars, even though he and his mother both worked for General Motors at one time or another. Shepard’s first car was a ’76 Pontiac Catalina he bought for $400 because it was cheap and it had a big-block. Before long, it was replaced with an ’84 Mustang.

“In high school, I had an ’84 Mustang GT that I took the engine out, rebuilt it, and did everything on that car because I was broke. I did everything on every car I had until about 15 years ago when I started making money, but less and less. Back then, cars lasted a few weeks. My ’84 Mustang, I got it in ’92. So seven years old, already a terrible piece of shit. The passenger seat, the weld broke and it was all over the place. The heater core went out in it, six years old. Everything was. The f–king shocks were shot.”

Shepard does still try to work on his own cars, but with a full-time acting career and a full-time dad career, he also occasionally employs Hot Rod Garage co-host Lucky Costa.

“I’m trying to think the last thing I did,” Shepard said. “I put rotors and pads and shit on my E 63 station wagon. I think it’s the last mechanical thing I did.”

Oh yes, Shepard also loves wagons. His Mercedes-AMG E 63 shares space with the ’94 Roadmaster, although the Buick makes more power from its supercharged Chevy LSA V-8 crate motor.

“I love wagons so much,” he said. “In fact, I think I could see myself getting two or three more wagons over the years. There’s so many good ones. Even within the supercar world, I like the shooting brakes. I’m deeply interested in that Ferrari FF ,and I’m delighted that the resale value is less than great because it makes me think it’s in the realm of possibility at some point. I guess I mostly like awkward, weird stuff that’s fast. And I love sedans that are fast. There’s something about fast sedans.”

Like any good car guy, he isn’t satisfied with the five cars, five motorcycles, four off-road toys, a shifter cart, and a pair of trailers littering his Santa Clarita ranch. He’s got his eye on several more, and even has plans for housing them all.

“I don’t drive all of them,” he said. “I’m mad I don’t drive all of them, and yet I’m actively, weekly looking at new cars I must acquire. I’ve got a couple that I’m circling right now. I keep going back. I keep looking at ’05, ’06 Bentley Continental GTS because they’re free. They’re free. They’re like 1/10th of what they were new. No miles with a W-12 twin-turbo and all-wheel-drive Volkswagen stuff. I’m like, ‘I should have this thing. Just take dirt roads going 70, who cares?’ That and all those, like the CL 55 and CL 63, those AMGs, those are free, too. You can get those for like in the teens with no miles.”

Even though his fix-or-repair-daily days are behind him, there are cars out there that make him want to get back under a lift.

“What I really, really want to build,” he continued, “is a ’68 to ’72-ish Blazer, long travel Blazer. That’s really, really what I want. Something, though, that is civil enough on the inside that my wife would drive it. But I want, basically, a sand dunes taxi when I have my whole family out there to go to this restaurant, Duner’s Diner, which is about 20 miles through the dunes. I really want that.

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“I’m thinking more and more about building a B-body ’94 Fleetwood, but three pedal, yeah. Those are the two that I’m closest to endeavoring on, but the whole issue I have currently is I don’t have room for all this stuff. We’ve been building a new house, and I’m building a barn there. So that should open up the floodgates to maybe one or two more builds.

“It won’t even be that big. When I say ‘barn,’ I’m playing it fast and loose with the term ‘barn.’ It’ll look like a barn, but it’ll probably hold five cars and maybe eight motorcycles in it. Well, with the lift, maybe six cars.”

Besides the Blazer, you can bet future builds will include more off-road stuff. In addition to previously owning a Class 3 Baja car, Shepard counts among his current collection a 1,000-hp twin-turbo LS3 sand rail.

“What I like about off-road is the barrier to entry is so much cheaper,” he said. “To go do a track day is always, who’s running the track? Whereas Glamis, Ocotillo, Gorman, you just show up and the whole place is yours and there’s no rules, and I love all that. So just the convenience of off-road. I also like that there’s a third dimension to it, so it’s not just cornering and accelerating, braking, but I love that there’s jumping as an aspect, that it becomes multidimensional.

“I’ve been crazy lucky,” he continued. “I’ve gotten to drive a ton of shit and be on a bunch of different tracks, but I don’t think there’s any driver’s sensation that compares to the dunes. Wheelie-ing over the tops of dunes and then just dropping down and there’s cornering and braking and keeping the front end light. There’s so much going on. It’s so stimulating. I think it blows away pretty much everything else.”

Of course, the dunes are also where Shepard had his biggest wreck.

“Not a big crasher,” he said. “Gone off the track a couple of times, but not in a colossal way that caused any damage. I really haven’t. I’ve cartwheeled a Razor once. That’s probably the only thing. I went end-over-end in a Razor in the sand dunes. We ripped off all of the control arms up front, but we had to drag it back with a sand car in reverse. The Razor had to be in reverse. Nothing on the front end was attached anymore. But yeah, I think that’s the only wreck I’ve had.”

He’s also gone down on a motorcycle, which ended in a shoulder surgery, but that hasn’t kept him off bikes.

“One of the first questions Jethro asked me when I met him was, ‘Why do you ride bikes?’” he said. “And I’m like, ‘Very simple: sub-400 pounds and 200 hp. Where are you going to find that power-to-weight ratio?’

“Also, what I love about bikes is, similar to off-road, you can’t destroy one. I’ve had a (Suzuki) GSX-R drag track bike for 10 years. Now I have a (Yamaha) R1 track bike. Never have replaced the pads. I do an oil change every 3,000 miles. You can just fu–king drive them and ride them at 13,000 rpm indefinitely and they’re fine. Like a track car, you’re constantly putting shit on. Tires, brakes, all this stuff, but a motorcycle, man, there’s not a better bang for the buck. Also, you can’t spend 25 grand on a motorcycle, you know? I’m super into Ducatis. It’s like a Ferrari for 20 grand. It’s crazy.”

On-road, off-road, and maybe even on motorcycles, Top Gear America starring Dax Shepard, Rob Corddry, and Jethro Bovingdon premieres next Spring, only on the MotorTrend app.

Stream TOP GEAR AMERICA starting Spring 2020 on the MotorTrend App. In the meantime, subscribe now to get the deal of the year.

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