Jesse James to Star in New TV Show on The Discovery Channel in 2012
Jesse James: Return of the outlaw biker By Susan Carpenter, Los Angeles Times
Jesse James had it all. The Hollywood A-list wife. A top-ranked cable-TV show. He'd built his Long Beach shop, West Coast Choppers, into an empire, wrenching custom $80,000-plus motorcycles for a celebrity clientele - an endeavor he spun off into a mass-market clothing line for Wal-Mart, a glossy gearhead magazine and an eco-friendly burger joint he hoped to franchise. That was early 2010. Two months later, he'd thrown it all away with a string of extramarital affairs that made James a household name for all the wrong reasons. "
Is the public ready to re-embrace the fallen star who had become the most hated man in America? The Discovery Channel thinks so, and so does James, who chalks up his indiscretions to being "miserable," he said in a Times interview. "I think people are tired of hearing about my personal life and ready to see me work again…. People have almost forgot that I am one of the best in the world at what I do."
Before his well-publicized affairs, James was the most famous name in modern motorcycling. A distant relative of the 19th century outlaw, he was a working-class aesthete whose welding skills and attention to detail elevated his handmade bikes to the height of artistry. A Long Beach native, he transformed his hard-knock upbringing into an enviable career as the star of Discovery's rip-it-apart-and-rebuild-it TV show "Monster Garage," where he met the celebrity that would later become his wife.
"I think I had to go through all the stuff I went through to find out what was really important. I'm a single dad to three kids, and that's 99% of my life. The other 1% is my work and creativity and being devoted to that," said the 42-year-old James, who says he isn't dating because "it's an energy sucker." He now lives on a ranch outside of Austin, Texas, having donated part of the West Coast Choppers complex to the Long Beach Rescue Mission.
James' appearance on "American Chopper" wasn't his idea but the Discovery
Channel's.
"Across the board, what works is authenticity," said "American
Chopper" executive producer Christo Doyle. "Jesse's the real deal. He's a
legitimate bike-builder, and now he's getting back to the craft that made him
who he is. People respect that aside from the other stuff that he's been sucked
into," said Doyle, who is also working with James on a pilot for a new show that
will start shooting in January and could be on the air as early as late spring
2012.
"People want nothing more than to tear down someone really
successful," said Nick Nanton, a celebrity branding specialist in Florida. "But
the only thing they love to do more than that is to build them back
up."
James' as-yet-unnamed series would include elements of "Monster
Garage," which remains Discovery's highest-rated series debut ever, with
2.6-million viewers. On the air four years, the program featured Jesse and his
team fabricating new machines out of raw metal to a soundtrack that was just as
hard and heavy. While the bikes and cars that were built for the show were
outrageous in their own right, it was James' talents and bravado that carried
the program.
He parlayed that into the 2009 Spike series "Jesse James Is
a Dead Man," the highest-rated series debut ever for Spike TV when it aired in
July 2009. It averaged 1.5 million weekly for its first season, but the show,
which featured James setting himself on fire and tearing down a drag strip on a
nitro bike, among other things, ran into insurance troubles, James said. "It was
getting really expensive and lawyers were stepping in saying you can't do this
or that."
A polarizing figure, James says exactly what's on his mind, and
he does it with humor and profanity. If he doesn't like someone, he'll say so,
as he's done with the Teutuls. "American Chopper" may have 1.8 million weekly
viewers, but that hasn't stopped James from dismissing the Teutuls as "cake
decorators."
Neither Teutul "would even know how to turn any of my
machines on, let alone use them," James says in Monday's show, among other,
not-for-print put-downs.
To fans, such statements are classic Jesse
James, but to casual viewers it may seem ungracious since James is, in effect, a
guest on what was once a rival show in an attempt to revitalize his image and
set the stage for a comeback.
"I would not have invited [James]," the
elder Teutul said in a Times interview, "because he's a jerk. The way he's
coming off, it's like he's doing us a favor. If he gets a show, it's great. I
hope he does.…. He hasn't been doing anything, and now all of the sudden he's
back. My question is, Why's he back?"
James vowed that his new show will
be a "bigger, better 'Monster Garage.' Something kind of gritty with a ticking
clock and me building a little bit nicer stuff," James said. " The ["American
Chopper"] build-off will showcase me."
The bike he's showing and allowing
viewers to vote on in a live program Tuesday, was built in his home garage in
Texas. Made from stainless steel, it's a return to form that demonstrates James'
new back-to-basics ethos.
"People act like I'm out at strip clubs every
night and having sex orgies," said James, "and you know what? I'm at home with
my kids every day and working. It would be great to have the perfect woman and
have a real relationship. I tried to force all that to happen, and it didn't,
and now I have to focus on what's really important. I don't have that great a
social life. I ride my bike to a friend's club. I sit in the back and drink
mineral water and watch a jazz trio play for a couple hours and then I ride
home. That's how I get down, man."
Source: http://mobile.latimes.com/p.p?a=rp&m=b&postId=1282286&curAbsIndex=0&resultsUrl=DID%3D6%26DFCL%3D1000%26DSB%3Drank%2523desc%26DBFQ%3DuserId%253A7%26DL.w%3D%26DL.d%3D10%26DQ%3DsectionId%253A5223%26DPS%3D0%26DPL%3D3