Amazon Studios greenlights James May travel doc

Amazon Studios has commissioned a six-part unscripted series with The Grand Tour presenter James May, titled Our Man In…Japan.

Fifteen years after May first visited Japan as a baffled tourist, he embarks on a quest to understand the unique, extraordinary and complex country.

He will embark on an epic journey across all of Japan from North to South, determined to understand why this unique land and its people are the way they are, what drives their whole culture and what their approach to life can teach the rest of us.

The new UK Prime Original series will be directed by BAFTA TV Award nominee Tom Whitter (Apollo 13: The Inside story) for Plum Pictures, where it will be exec produced by Will Daws.

The team start filming today and will launch the show exclusively on Amazon Prime Video in territories worldwide.

“Japan is the most amazing place I’ve ever visited,” said James May. “Everything about it is a surprise: a boiled sweet, a bullet train, an unexpected ancient temple, and the challenge of eating a single edamame bean with chopsticks.

“It’s a class A stimulant for all the senses, and an etiquette minefield for the unwary. I intend to immerse myself in it completely, in the pursuit of enlightenment and life balance.”

Georgia Brown, director of Prime Original Series in Europe, added: ‘We’re incredibly excited to announce this new project with James, which will see him take on an epic thousand mile journey across ancient Japanese islands, mega cities, and all points in between.