Veteran actor William Fichtner is all revved up for new ‘Top Gear’ series

If William Fichtner’s face looks familiar, it’s because you’ve likely seen him before in the dozens of TV and movie roles in which he’s appeared in a busy acting career dating back 30 years.

Now Fichtner takes on his unlikeliest role yet — as the co-host of “Top Gear America,” premiering July 30 on BBC America. The eight-episode series, a revamped version of “Top Gear USA” — which aired on A&E (2010-2016) — pairs Fichtner with world champion drag racer Antron Brown and British automotive journalist Tom “Wookie” Ford as they give an Americanized spin (literally) on the world of cars.

Fichtner, 60 — who grew up outside of Buffalo in Cheektowaga — spoke to The Post about his new gig from the upstate set of “Cold Brook,” a big-screen movie he co-wrote, produced, directs and stars in.

I didn’t know you were a gear head (?)

There are people who are more gear heads than I am. I’m an automotive fan. I love motor sports and I love to watch motor sports. I love it all.

How did you get the job?

Back up about seven or eight months now. The good folks over at BBC America reached out to talk about doing a version of “Top Gear” that they felt would really dive into the car culture of America. When my agent called and told me I thought, ‘Huh.’ I’m at a place in my life where things that make me happy are the things I’m most interested in doing. I know about “Top Gear” and watched the original show. I wanted to hear what [BBC America] was thinking about … and I sat down with the showrunner Jake Cardew and the other great guys on the team and talked about it.

I said, “Wow, I’m interested” and I asked who the other two hosts were going to be. In January we did a little audition with a few cameras and a bunch of guys interested in being part of show. I have to be honest; all the guys there were super-nice and super-knowledgeable — they’re a lot smarter than I am about cars — but I didn’t really feel like the chemistry was right. We did one more little vignette at the end of the night with Tom Ford and Antron, the three of us together, and after five minutes I talked to the BBC America guys and said, “I don’t know what you’re thinking, but that’s your show right there.”

Were you always interested in cars?

Since I was 16, when I got my ’69 [Plymouth] Roadrunner in high school. I’ve always loved hot rods and going to drag races. NHRA drag racing is my top of the list. I’m not someone who’s ever owned a race car, but about 10 or 12 years ago I was invited to do the Toyota Grand Prix weekend, when Indy cars race on the streets of Long Beach [California]. It was the first time I really had a chance to be in a race situation — it’s a great event for children’s hospitals in Orange and Long Beach counties — and I came in third. And out of that experience came another charity race with stock cars for Kids Against Cancer. When we had challenges on [“Top Gear USA”] all that driving is us. It’s not that we didn’t have other guys with us training and helping us, but when you see clips of our faces in the cars, those are our faces in the cars doing that.

Was shooting “Top Gear America” anything like what you expected?

All I can tell you about the first season was that it was six tons of baloney in a two-ton pack. We went everywhere — it was intense, crazy and we were all over place. We got to pull out some fantasy stuff; some of the things we shot that I wasn’t part of I told everybody, “Listen, next year we’re doing that episode again. I gotta do that.” For the opener, we went down and ran tracks in Baja, Mexico. We took old ’80s cars and went to one of the original dirt tracks in North Carolina. We went up into the mountains in Central California and ran crazy ATV vehicles, hot-rod things. I did a segment on the ’55 Cadillac and … what happened in our history that this was the car people wanted. Antron did an incredible piece on minivans and “Wookie” hopped in some real deal top cars and police cars.

“Top Gear America” 8 p.m. Sunday on BBC America