Former Top Gear and The Grand Tour presenter James May is facing a tough situation. Ticket sales for his new solo stage show, James May: Explorers. The Age of Discovery, have been very disappointing.
Wednesday night’s second show of James’ 13-date UK tour at Bath’s Forum had many empty seats – row after row of them.
The show, connected to his recent documentary James May’s Greatest Explorers, aimed to combine stagecraft with James May’s familiar style of narration, offering ‘an evening of compelling intellectual entertainment.’
Some 800 tickets went unsold in the 1,640-capacity venue – which is around half.
Viewership of his program featuring historical explorers was quite poor. As a result, theatre management closed off the entire 460-seat rear section of the Somerset theatre. Those who did attend were then moved to seats closer to the stage, seemingly to give the impression of a larger audience.
Approximately two weeks before the performance on Wednesday night, Ticketline, the ticketing provider, emailed customers who had purchased less expensive tickets in the back section. The email offered them a complimentary upgrade to better seats with a clearer view of the stage.
I’m writing to you about your tickets for James May at Bath Forum on October 1st, 2025. We’ve been notified by the venue that the rear circle seating area will be closed for this performance.
Your previous tickets can’t be used anymore. We’ve assigned you new seats, and they are located in the front circle.
Oh my gosh, when I finally got inside, the ushers tried to explain what happened, and it was just… heartbreaking. They said, and I quote, ‘As you can see, we just haven’t sold enough tickets and everyone who has bought in the rear circle has been offered tickets closer to the stage so the entire rear circle is closed.’ Basically, they moved people *from* the back to fill in the front, but it meant the whole section was empty! It was so sad to see, but at least those who *did* buy tickets there got better seats, I guess. Still, it was a bit of a buzzkill to see all those empty seats where I was hoping to be!
The back section of the theatre – which has 462 seats – was entirely closed off. This report also noted only 137 people using the 333 seats in the front section. This left 196 seats unoccupied in the front circle as well.
A total of 685 seats in the front and rear circles were unoccupied. Additionally, there were significant empty spaces in the stalls section directly in front of the stage – potentially around another 150 seats were vacant.
James, who is 62 years old, attempted to downplay the noticeably small audience size a few times throughout the two-hour program.
As James walked onto the stage, his opening line was, ‘Thank you very much for coming. Especially to those who made the effort to attend, even if it meant pretending to be empty seats!’
He then drew a comparison between his show and those presented by astronomer Brian Cox, stating his own show was ‘much bigger and much more popular than mine’.
And then he jokingly thanked the audience for coming back from the interval for the second half.
Friday night’s show at the Bristol Hippodrome has so far similarly attracted dismal ticket sales.
As of 10am today, 1,490 tickets were still available. This means that only 451 tickets had been sold for the event, which has a total capacity of 1,941 people – representing just 23% of the venue’s capacity.
The current situations of James May and his previous Top Gear and Grand Tour colleagues, Jeremy Clarkson, 65, and Richard Hammond, 55, are quite contrasting. Their careers have taken very different paths.
The trio wound up their 22-year collaboration as co-presenters last autumn.
Jeremy is having the most successful period of his career right now, finishing up the fifth season of the popular Amazon Prime show, Clarkson’s Farm, this week.
The popular television personality was honored with a National Television Award just last month, winning the Best Factual Entertainment prize for Clarkson’s Farm.
As James stood before a mostly empty local theatre, Jeremy was enjoying the success of announcing that filming had wrapped on the fifth season of Clarkson’s Farm. The show has inspired several related businesses, including a brewery, a butcher shop, and a popular pub in the Cotswolds – which currently has a waiting list for reservations.
Jeremy also hosts a reboot of Who Wants to Be a Millionaire.
Richard recently shared that he’s had a very difficult year, calling it the worst of his life. This comes after a challenging time at work and as he’s navigating a difficult and costly divorce.
Richard recently shared his experiences with Daily Mail, discussing a challenging year that included his divorce, the loss of his father, Alan, and the conclusion of The Grand Tour.
First, his long and successful collaboration on screen with close friends James May and Jeremy Clarkson concluded with a poignant final episode of The Grand Tour. ‘That was a significant loss. Truly huge.’ Shortly after, his father, Alan, passed away in a hospice at the age of 80 after battling cancer. They had a very close relationship. ‘I loved him deeply.’
Another difficult event occurred in January when Richard and Mindy Hammond revealed they were divorcing after 23 years of marriage.
Right at the start of the first episode of Richard Hammond’s Workshop, the presenter addresses something directly. The series follows his challenges with running a business that restores classic cars, but he feels he needs to explain some recent gossip. ‘Things have changed for me a bit lately,’ he says. ‘I’ve gotten divorced, and that means I’m now living here.’
It’s clear that James is finding it hard to stay popular and connect with audiences these days, especially if his recent solo performance – which is also connected to a new TV show on Channel 5 – is any indication.
James appeared quite disappointed while on stage, stating: ‘As we developed this show, we soon discovered it dealt with an incredibly complex topic. It essentially encompasses the entire human experience, and we’re only just beginning to scratch the surface of it.’
Addressing a partially filled auditorium, he continued: ‘If you enjoy this, and I’m hoping you will, we could return next year for Explorers 2, then Explorers 3 the year after, and even Explorers 4, eventually building it into something similar to the Mission Impossible series. You might even wonder, ‘Is he *still* making Explorers films? I thought he’d stopped!’
Oh, it just broke my heart to see it fall apart! It really did, you know? The jokes just weren’t landing, and honestly, there were so many technical difficulties. I mean, right at the beginning, a smoke machine went totally overboard – it filled the whole stage with mist and you couldn’t even see the presenter! And poor Brett, his sidekick – he’s an Australian guy, such a funny dude – you could barely hear a word he said because of the sound problems. It was just… painful to watch, honestly.
James was able to seize an opportunity after 24 minutes to cleverly turn an awkward moment into a promotion for his gin. The audience chuckled when he twice joked about his former colleague, Hammond, coloring his hair.
However, it became clear things weren’t going well after the initial 25 minutes. When he said there would be a break ‘much later on’ with drinks available at the theatre bar, the audience responded with a rather awkward cheer.
When May returned to the stage immediately following the intermission, he appeared genuine as he addressed the audience, saying: ‘Thank you for coming back‘.
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2025-10-03 18:37