9 Celebrity Couples Who Had Secret Weddings

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In a world where the Kardashians exist, it can be pretty shocking when a celebrity is able to do something — especially something as big as getting married — in private. Shouldn't there be, like, ten helicopters full of cameramen capturing every angle possible? And shouldn't the couple be live-tweeting everything that happens, from hair and makeup to the weird uncle's embarrassing speech?

Apparently it is possible to avoid those things. Some celebrities, most recently socialite and fashionista Olivia Palermo, manage to tie the knot in secret. Of course we find out that it happened soon after, because they can't keep everything from us. Still, couples who can keep it under the radar continue to impress, especially when we didn't even know they were engaged, and especially especially when we didn't even know they were a couple. Here are just nine celebrity weddings that happened in secret.

1. Beyonce and Jay-Z

(Photo: Rob Rich / WENN.com)

These two got married in a very secret ceremony in 2008, and they've managed to keep it under wraps for six whole years. But I guess now that they're touring together, they figured they could finally give us a taste of what it was like to be there by showing private video footage in concert.

2. Leighton Meester and Adam Brody

(Photo: TRY CW / WENN.com)

These two adorable people have kept their relationship pretty private in general. They didn't even confirm their engagement and had barely confirmed their relationship before Adam was photographed sporting a wedding ring. Just going about their lives and getting married like normal people do. Can you imagine?!

3. Kate Winslet and Ned Rocknroll

(Photo: O'Neill/White,PacificCoastNews)

We were shocked enough to learn that Kate Winslet was married (with Leo walking her down the aisle!), but when we heard the guy's name we thought we were most definitely dreaming. And then later Kate got pregnant and gave birth to a kid named Bear Blaze and we were conflicted about which name confused us the most.

4. Ryan Reynolds and Scarlett Johansson

(Photo: PacificCoastNews.com)

Having a private wedding doesn't guarantee that your marriage will last, as evidenced by these two. They got married in secret at a Canadian resort after apparently inviting guests via text message. But they still got divorced less than two years later. Which is crazy, because look how happy they look in that photo!

5. Ryan Reynolds and Blake Lively

(Photo: WENN)

Secret weddings are kind of Ryan Reynolds' thing, and he kept the tradition going when he married Blake back in 2012. They hadn't even confirmed their relationship, and they still aren't seen together as often as most Hollywood couples. Maybe they'll get divorced in secret too and we don't know until it's two years later and Ryan's got a new wife.

6. Kerry Washington and Nnamdi Asomugha

(Photo: Brian To / WENN.com)

Kerry Washington and her football player husband tied the knot last summer, and it stayed under wraps for more than a week before the marriage certificate surfaced. They kept their relationship private before the wedding and continue to do so after. Kerry even kept the birth of her daughter a secret for a while, and even after it was announced she still didn't really admit to it. Very impressive.

7. Gwyneth Paltrow and Chris Martin

(Photo: WhiteBronco/ BWP Media/ Pacific Coast News)

They've been through a "conscious uncoupling" in recent months, but back in 2003 these two tied the knot in a very private ceremony. They didn't even have any family members in attendance. This was shortly after they announced Gwyneth was pregnant with Apple. Ah, simpler times in the Goop household.

8. Jennifer Love Hewitt and Brian Hallisay

(Photo: PacificCoastNews.com)

These two really like to kill two birds with one stone. A day after she announced her pregnancy, J.Love's engagement went public. Months later, we found out about the birth of her baby and her secret wedding at the same time.

9. Rachel Weisz and Daniel Craig

(Photo: WENN.com)

These two British hotties got married in 2011 in a super private New York ceremony only attended by four guests. And three years later they continue to intimidate me with their attractiveness.

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WGA East Charges Reality-TV Producers With Creating “Sweatshop” Conditions For A “Beleaguered And Exhausted Workforce” At NYC Hearing

They may not be under-age moppets toiling in Dickensian work-houses, but like Oliver Twist, writer-producers in New York City's reality TV industry are saying, "Please, sir, I want some more." Their collective voices were heard today during testimony before the New York City Council's Civil Service & Labor Committee, which is investigating allegations of sweatshop conditions at the city's reality TV production houses. Although invited, executives from those companies opted not to attend.

Lowell Peterson, executive director of the WGA East, estimated that some 15,000 New Yorkers are currently working in nonfiction television. Approximately 2,200 are writers and producers who "often work 12, 14, 16 hours or more per day," the WGA Eas t said in The Real Reality: Working Conditions in the Nonfiction and Reality Television Industry in NYC. The a report, presented to the council, recommends codifying reality-TV production practices. "Eight-hour days are rare," according to the report. The writers "often work weeks or even months without a day off. Five-day weeks are also rare. And 88% of producers and associate producers said they were 'never' paid overtime on their current jobs. When coupled with periods of unemployment between jobs, and no paid time off (vacation or sick leave) allowed while on a job, these exhausting work schedules lead to severe burn-out."

"Today you will hear the tale of two television industries," Peterson told the committee. "Most of our members work in the part of the industry that provides good benefits, good pay, good middle-class careers. Today you are investigating the other part of the industry – nonfiction or 'reality' TV – which is almost e ntirely nonunion. People in that part of the industry work brutally long hours without overtime pay, without health or pension benefits, without paid time off, without the basic protections they deserve."

The guild has been organizing reality show writers and producers in New York for the last five years. So far, it's only signed contracts with three of the more than 20 companies there that each employ more than 50 writer-producers. It's been trying to get a contract with ITV Studios, producers of A&E's The First 48 and TLC's Four Weddings, for the past four years.

So-called "wage theft" – the non-payment of overtime through the misclassification of employees as freelancers – dominated much of the testimony. Sarah Leberstein, an attorney with the National Employment Law Project, said that this widespread practice "illegally depresses labor costs and cheats workers out of the wages they've earned." City Councilman I. Daneek Miller, who chaired the hearing, noted the city and state are "losing tax revenue" as a consequence of the practice.

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WGA East Charges Reality-TV Producers With Creating "Sweatshop" Conditions For A "Beleaguered And Ex …

Reality TV shows are currently not eligible to receive New York film tax subsidies, although Peterson said that industry executives are currently lobbying to be included in those tax breaks. Miller, a former union president, said he would strongly oppose extending those subsidies to reality TV unless the industry stops mistreating workers. "I find it appalling," he said, "that the executives of these industries have not shown up to justify their positions nor to justify their asking for millions of dollars of subsidies in taxpayer dollars so they can continue to make a lot of money and exploit workers."

The WGA report said working under these conditions isn't sustainable over the long term. "Last month, I worked 18 days straight without a break," said one writer-producer in the report. "Each of these days averaged about 13-14 hours, including one day where I worked from 10 am on Friday until 8 am on Saturday, and was back at work from 3:30 pm Saturday until midnight. It was one of the most miserable experiences of my life and I felt lucky when I got paid regular time for the two weekends I worked straight through."

The report said that jobs in NYC's reality TV sector grew 20% from 2001-2011, while jobs in the rest of the local economy dropped 5% in the same period. "It's not that this television industry, the reality TV part, is weak and impoverished," Peterson testified. "To the contrary, more and more hours of cable and network TV are filled with nonfiction 'reality' shows. The industry is booming. Profits are ballooning. Smart investors and production company executives are placing heavy bets that the profits will continue to grow."

Veteran non-fiction television producer David Van Taylor testified this morning about how the companies are "squeezing freelancers beyond the limits of the law.� �� Story editor Loren Veloski described "a beleaguered and exhausted" workforce subjected to "inhumanely long hours" and "rampant and systematic wage theft."

The WGA called for a host of changes to improve the lot of its members, including:

* A Code of Conduct that would provide for reasonable production budgets and production schedules
* Adequate staffing levels;
* Guarantees that employees will not be required to work excessive hours, and that all wage and hour laws are honored;
* Paid time off;
* Basic benefits including company-paid health coverage;
* A commitment to honor the right of employees to select representatives for collective bargaining and to negotiate reasonable agreements.

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Why receiving Beyonce's latest fragrance means your relationship is doomed: What his perfume present says about you

• Celebrity perfume tends to be bought by men for casual partners
• A romantic choice means your man has a long term scenario in mind
• Men who are married or in long term relationships plump for classics

By Ruth Styles

PUBLISHED: 10:17 EST, 19 December 2013 | UPDATED: 13:44 EST, 19 December 2013

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Everyone likes finding a new perfume under the tree come December 25th but while some fragrances reveal just how much your other half loves you, others could be a sign that things are going awry.

New research has found that the perfume a man chooses for his partner offers an indication of how serious he feels the relationship is.

And it's bad news for fans of celebrity fragrance - men who slip perfumes by Beyonce, One Direction or Britney into their partner's stockings see the liaison as nothing more than a casual fling.

Out of luck: If a perfume by Beyonce turns up in your stocking, it would seem that you're just a fling

But if you get a romantic choice such as Beautiful by Estee Lauder, Romance by Ralph Lauren or J'Adore by Christian Dior, it means he sees you as a keeper.

Interestingly, the results were mirrored by the feelings of the recipients, with women gifted a celebrity fragrance saying the present lacked the personal touch, while more than half of those who received a romantic choice felt a romantic sounding fragrance was a sure sign they were meant to be.

But romantic choices aren't the only perfume used to make potential partners happy. Women in new relationships tend to receive daring designer choices, as men make a bid to impress with their perfume know-how.

Typical gifts doled out by men with new loves include Flora by Gucci, Candy by Prada, Daisy by Marc Jacobs and Just Cavalli by Roberto Cavalli.

Better: Chanel No. 5 means an established relationship while Ralph Lauren's Romance was picked by lovers

While new couples tend to exchange cutting edge fragrances, those in long term relationships prefer to present their other half with a classic choice such as Chanel No.5.

Other popular options, according to the survey of 2,000 male shoppers at Debenhams, included Thierry Mugler's Angel, Opium by Yves Saint Laurent and Tresor by Lancôme.

Commenting on the revelations, a spokesperson for Debenhams said: 'For centuries we've been taught the bigger and more extravagant the gift the more your partner thinks of you, when all along the key to discovering where your relationship is heading can be found in a bottle of perfume.

'Our survey brings to life the time old method of communication of a "message in a bottle" proving that even with all the technological advances this form of communication never fails us!'

CHRISTMAS PERFUME DECODED: WHAT THA T NEW SCENT REALLY MEANS

From Our Moment by One Direction to Ralph Lauren's Romance, here's what his festive gift reveals about your relationship.

Romance by Ralph Lauren

If you get the American brand's romantic rosy perfume under your tree, then you could be onto a winner. 67 per cent of men who purchased fragrances with loving or pretty names said it reflected their feelings towards their new partner.

Just Cavalli by Roberto Cavalli

If a daring designer name appears in your stocking then your new (or potential) man is doing his best to impress you. 29 per cent of those asked said that showing off their perfume know-how is a key part of cementing a new relationship.

Our Moment by One Direction

This is one fragrance you really don't want to unwrap if you're hoping for something more from your current relationship. A staggering 58 per cent of men said they would present celebrity perfumes to the female half of a fling or casual relationship.

Chanel No.5

Getting a classic scent like Chanel No. 5 or Angel by Thierry Mugler means you're firmly ensconced as the number one woman in his life, according to the survey. 47 per cent of male shoppers said that a beautiful well-loved perfume was the perfect choice for a long term love.

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Longest Celebrity Marriages In Bollywood

Longest Celebrity Marriages In Bollywood

1/9

Amitabh and Jaya Bachchan

They fell in love and tied the knot. However, Big B got carried away by the charm of Rekha while shooting Do Anjaane and the romance became the talk of the town. However, Big B and Rekha parted their ways after Silsila released which was based on their love triangle. Their 41 years of marriage is a proof that the strong marital bond can't be broken easily!

Longest Celebrity Marriages In Bollywood

2/9

Dilip Kumar and Saira Banu

This celebrity marriage raised many eyebrows and drew criticism as Dilip married 20 years younger Gopi co-star, Saira Banu. However, after tying the knot in 1966, the couple are still going strong with God's grace.

Longest Celebrity Marriages In Bollywood

3/9

Longest Celebrity Marriages In Bollywood

4/9

Jeetendra and Shobha Kapoor

Jeetendra was a Casanova in his young days but after tying the knot with his air hostess girlfriend, Shobha, Jeetu proved that marriages can work in the glamourous world.

Longest Celebrity Marriages In Bollywood

5/9

Rishi Kapoor and Neetu Singh

The co-stars are not only loved on-screen but off-screen as well. Rishi and Neetu tied the knot in 1980 and even after 34 years of marriage, they look charming and very much in love.

Longest Celebrity Marriages In Bollywood

6/9

Shatrughan Sinha and Poonam Sinha

They too got married in 1980 and after 3 decades of togetherness, Shotgun and his gorgeous wife are still going strong.

Longest Celebrity Marriages In Bollywood

7/9

Longest Celebrity Marriages In Bollywood

8/9

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Leah Remini TV show: What real families can learn from reality TV

Actress Leah Remini, known best for her role in the sitcom "King of Queens," is entering the reality show gauntlet starting this summer. It raises the question of what it takes for a family to survive that kind of "reality."

The new TV show called "Leah Remini: It's All Relative" premiering on the TLC cable network in July, is intended as a romp through her "hilarious" family members' daily lives. Ms. Remini, her husband Angelo, her mother and staff are all billed as part of the cast with her daughter reportedly still on the fence about joining, according to media reports. 

While I think Remini is funny, I hope she and her family can retain their sense of humor through this experience which has strained a lot of family relations of those who trod the reality TV path before, thanks to opening themselves up to public opinion and the strain of living in a fishbowl.

Recommended: Test your camp counselor IQ

All of America is going to join the Remini family as voting members of an unseen tribunal that could potentially be waiting to see them at their worst, read into what they say, and often laughing at and not with them. 

I often think that families of the already famous have a better shot at survival than regular folks like me because they have already had to develop a thick skin and cope with the press. 

My family wouldn't make it a day in the reality world.

We would have trouble coping with the invasiveness, the misunderstandings of our personalities, and not to mention all the helpful advice slamming them from know-nothing bloggers like me.

While I'm not going to delve too deeply or seriously into the mechanics of this kind of television, it's worth taking a quick look at some of the shows out there, including the casualties, and survivors.

First on the list of those I feel for is "Toddler's & Tiaras" star Alana Thompson, also kno wn as pint-size beauty queen Honey Boo-Boo, with her own show also on the TLC network. I once wrote about how much I liked the Little Miss Sunshine of reality TV for her, well, reality.

However, reading the Chicago Sun-Times account of the child's appearance last week on "The Tonight Show," which described her as "a tiny, dimpled monster," I am sad, but unsurprised. 

My lack of shock in this instance comes from the short mental check list I have developed for success or failure in the family reality show world. It includes:

1. Have a big family with extended clan for backup and to use as a foil.

Right off the bat it seems to me that in order to really survive "reality" TV it helps to be a big family like the Duggars on TLC's "19 Kids & Counting," or the Robertsons on A&E network's "Duck Dynasty."

It seems that bigger families are microcosms, little worlds unto themselves to which members can retreat. To use a Du ck Dynasty analogy, it's harder for media and the public to hit a whole spread of moving targets.

Although the exception to this rule is "Jon & Kate Plus 8" (originally on TLC) now "Kate Plus 8" (now on the Discovery Health Channel) and the ongoing misery over everything from their bitter divorce to how they raising their kids. Which leads me to my second point;

2. Have parents who have managed to maintain a relationship through thick and thin before TV came along.

It seems that while the TV camera is said to add 10 pounds to one's appearance, it adds a ton of excess weight to a relationship.

The Gosslin's have shown that in a family of any size, the parents' relationship has to be one of the most stable rocks in the family foundation, or the audience will feast on the hot mess the "reality" family quickly becomes.

I think the fact that the heads of the Robertson family Kay and Phil, admit to having had marital issues ear lier in their lives and are now a battle tested unit is an edge that is getting that family through all kinds of bombardment over their beliefs. 

Which conveniently leads to my third point about what a family needs in order to cope with being this kind of "real" and that's faith.

3. Have faith, in the heads of the household, each other, and perhaps a higher power than cable networks, fan mail, or ratings.

Faith-based lifestyles, no matter what the religion, give families somewhere to roll eyes to for help. It seems from the marriage bond to siblings sticking together, the reality TV success formula needs multiple shots of ties that bind.

For instance, you don't have to share their religious views to recognize and respect the fact that both the Duggars and the Robertons have strong faith connections, which in many ways help to unify their families. 

Remini famously and publicly split from the Church of Scientology in 2013 after 30 years of commitment to it. While Remini's family and friends stuck by her through her denouncement of her church, I wonder if that  unifying experience alone will be enough to keep them calm under the lights and with cameras rolling.

Of course there are anomalies to any system, in this case the ever-expanding world of reality television, and families like the Osbournes and Kardashians are both examples of how the family unit can have sometimes repeated failures, yet still thrive under the klieg lights.

Kelly and Sharon Osbourne now have successful careers in television outside of the reality realm, and the Kardashian's – love them or loathe them – are a pop-culture empire, with all the good and bad that comes with that title. 

This list is of course far from being scientific, just like reality TV is far from being reality. But it offers a few reminders for off-screen families too. Put family first, nurture vital relationships, and remain faithful, and you can weather whatever reality throws at you (even though for most of us our reality is much less glamorous than what's seen on TV). 

Most bad situations are survivable if we remember to take the occasional break from the drama for a word from our family sponsors: love, laughter, and forgiveness.

Recommended: Test your camp counselor IQ

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‘In real life great love stories mostly end in tragedy...’

Newton and Shakespeare make for a strange match that finds expression in Ranjan Ghosh's directorial debut that is slated to release next month, writes shoma a chatterji

RANJAN Ghosh was instrumental in the script of Aparna Sen's Iti Mrinalini, his diploma project for his screenplay writing course at Whistling Woods in Mumbai, and Hrid Majharey (Live in my Heart) marks his directorial debut. A graduate with honours in physics, Ghosh was intrigued by Newton, who discovered gravity, and also took keen interest in alchemy and studied astrology. This conflict between reason and things that cannot be explained by reason or science forms the philosophy of Hrid Majharey. But Shakespeare's tragic hero also finds a place in the story. Excerpts:

Q  Your film is a strikingly original blend of the battle between logic and things logic cannot explain on the one hand and a kind of return to the tragic hero drawn from Shakespeare's plays on the other. How do you explain this?
Personally, I do not believe in things that reason and science cannot explain. This dichotomy in people of science would often make me wonder whether Newton was motivated by a drive for more knowledge, or was it something else? Later, I met many who swore by science and logic but also wore stones on their arms and fingers in the belief that this would change their lives for the better. I wished to explore a character torn by science on the one hand and chance on the other. My hero, Abhijit (Abir) Chatterjee is an example of this dichotomy that could take a man to extremes he is not aware of himself.

Q  You have said that your hero is also a creation of the impact Shakespeare's tragic heroes made on you. How do you explain this?
and resonances of Shakespeare's tragic heroes, both men and women, are around us in real life. Sometimes, the resemblance is so uncanny that they seem to pop out of his plays. As a writer, it has been a challenge for me to tackle this subject because in real life great love stories mostly end in tragedy, as they do in fiction.

Q  Do you think the parallels drawn with the Shakespearean tragic hero and the hero of your film will be understood by the audience?
Let me make myself clear. The film is not at all an adaptation of any of Shakespeare's tragedies. The characters are inspired by a few of Shakespeare's characters but are contemporary, modern and belong to the urban, Bengali upper middle class. Those familiar with Shakespeare will find the resemblance. Those who are not familiar with Shakespeare will read a different kind of love story in the film.

Q  In your film, Abhijit Chatterjee gets sucked into the vortex of destiny and loses hold of his mathematical logic. But real life is a combination of logic and destiny. How would you explain this?
Look here, cinema might reflect life but it is not life. It has the fluid means of interpreting and questioning in addition to translating and reflecting. Cinema is a state of heightened reality. Therefore, everything that happens in real life need not necessarily be there in cinema.

Q  Isn't the "failed" and "tragic" hero a great commercial risk for you to have taken in your debut film?
We often see weak characters becoming strong, fearful people becoming fearless and so on. It is always a "positive" character arc. But how often have we seen a character moving from strength to weakness, from being positive to being negative? Possibly I was trying to explore and address these dichotomies that lie within us, waiting to come out when, suddenly, a tragedy… this was also to address the dichotomies in all of us…

Q  How did you choose your handpicked cast for the film – Raima Sen, Abir, Arun Mukherjee, Sohag Sen, Indrashish, etc?
Raima's face cropped up when I was writing the script so I decided she would portray Debjani. She liked the script. I was confused about who would play Abhijit. I saw Abir as Byomkesh Bakshi in a Byomkesh Bakshi film and I at once felt that I had an actor who could portray the complex character of Abhijit. The character Indrashish plays is loosely adapted from Cassius in Othello and I gave him a look completely different from the look that Abhijit carries in the film. And Sohagdi was the perfect choice for the faith-reader who changes Abhijit's life forever. Barun Chanda's personality and diction was just perfect as the head of the maths department. Arun Mukherjee fit the Bangladeshi refugee in Port Blair like a glove.

Q  The music?
My only brief to our music director Mayookh Bhaumik was to keep it simple and minimalistic. Dipankar Chaki has done the sound design and I am honoured that two National Award-winners agreed to collaborate in my first film. My intention was to harmoniously use both music and sound design to achieve the two diametric elements of harmony and distortion of harmony that dog Abhiji t throughout the film.

Q  When is Hrid Majharey expected to hit the theatres?
11 July 2014.

Newton and Shakespeare make for a strange match that finds expression in Ranjan Ghosh's directorial debut that is slated to release next month, writes shoma a chatterji

RANJAN Ghosh was instrumental in the script of Aparna Sen's Iti Mrinalini, his diploma project for his screenplay writing course at Whistling Woods in Mumbai, and Hrid Majharey (Live in my Heart) marks his directorial debut. A graduate with honours in physics, Ghosh was intrigued by Newton, who discovered gravity, and also took keen interest in alchemy and studied astrology. This conflict between reason and things that cannot be explained by reason or science forms the philosophy of Hrid Majharey. But Shakespeare's tragic hero also finds a place in the story. Excerpts:

Q  Your film is a strikingly original blend of the battle between logic and things logic cannot explain on the one hand and a kind of return to the tragic hero drawn from Shakespeare's plays on the other. How do you explain this?
Personally, I do not believe in things that reason and science cannot explain. This dichotomy in people of science would often make me wonder whether Newton was motivated by a drive for more knowledge, or was it something else? Later, I met many who swore by science and logic but also wore stones on their arms and fingers in the belief that this would change their lives for the better. I wished to explore a character torn by science on the one hand and chance on the other. My hero, Abhijit (Abir) Chatterjee is an example of this dichotomy that could take a man to extremes he is not aware of himself.

Q  You have said that your hero is also a creation of the impact Shakespeare's tragic heroes made on you. How do you explain this?
and resonances of Shakespeare's tragic heroes, both men and women, are around us in real life. Sometimes, the resemblance is so uncanny that they seem to pop out of his plays. As a writer, it has been a challenge for me to tackle this subject because in real life great love stories mostly end in tragedy, as they do in fiction.

Q  Do you think the parallels drawn with the Shakespearean tragic hero and the hero of your film will be understood by the audience?
Let me make myself clear. The film is not at all an adaptation of any of Shakespeare's tragedies. The characters are inspired by a few of Shakespeare's characters but are contemporary, modern and belong to the urban, Bengali upper middle class. Those familiar with Shakespeare will find the resemblance. Those who are not familiar with Shakespeare will read a different kind of love story in the film.

Q  In your film, Abhijit Chatterjee gets sucked into the vortex of destiny and loses hold of his mathematical logic. But real life is a combination of logic and destiny. How would you explain this?
Look here, cinema might reflect life but it is not life. It has the fluid means of interpreting and questioning in addition to translating and reflecting. Cinema is a state of heightened reality. Therefore, everything that happens in real life need not necessarily be there in cinema.

Q  Isn't the "failed" and "tragic" hero a great commercial risk for you to have taken in your debut film?
We often see weak characters becoming strong, fearful people becoming fearless and so on. It is always a "positive" character arc. But how often have we seen a character moving from strength to weakness, from being positive to being negative? Possibly I was trying to explore and address these dichotomies that lie within us, waiting to come out when, suddenly, a tragedy… this was also to address the dichotomies in all of us…

Q  How did you choose your handpicked cast for the film – Raima Sen, Abir, Arun Mukherjee, Sohag Sen, Indrashish, etc?
Raima's face cropped up when I was writing the script so I decided she would portray Debjani. She liked the script. I was confused about who would play Abhijit. I saw Abir as Byomkesh Bakshi in a Byomkesh Bakshi film and I at once felt that I had an actor who could portray the complex character of Abhijit. The character Indrashish plays is loosely adapted from Cassius in Othello and I gave him a look completely different from the look that Abhijit carries in the film. And Sohagdi was the perfect choice for the faith-reader who changes Abhijit's life forever. Barun Chanda's personality and diction was just perfect as the head of the maths department. Arun Mukherjee fit the Bangladeshi refugee in Port Blair like a glove.

Q  The music?
My only brief to our music director Mayookh Bhaumik was to keep it simple and minimalistic. Dipankar Chaki has done the sound design and I am honoured that two National Award-winners agreed to collaborate in my first film. My intention was to harmoniously use both music and sound design to achieve the two diametric elements of harmony and distortion of harmony that dog Abhiji t throughout the film.

Q  When is Hrid Majharey expected to hit the theatres?
11 July 2014.

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Welcome to the brave nude world of reality TV

Kicking off her bikini bottoms, Brooklyn-born singleton Christina Porcelli steps out from behind a palm tree to greet her blind date, who is letting it all hang out as the cameras zoom in for a close-up. "Remember to look him in the eye," Porcelli tells herself, trying hard not to cross her arms over her bare chest. "Don't look down."

When Tina and Chris, stars of TLC's new "Buying Naked," look at houses, they won't be worrying about walk-in closets.Photo: Discovery Communications

Lifetime's "Born in the Wild" will show pregnant moms going back to nature.

Inevitably, she sneaks a peek. Huzzah! The highly amusing reaction shot — the "raised eyebrow" moment that has become so ubiquitous on reality TV — is in the bag.

It's no surprise that "Dating Naked," VH1's latest foray into the so-called "unscripted" category, is slated as the next small-screen hit of the summer. Porcelli is among dozens of contestants who agreed to strip naked in the pursuit of love and reality-TV fame — and the series, filmed at a luxury resort in Panama, is expected to top the network's charts when it airs next month.

Borrowing heavily from ABC's "The Bachelor" — with shades of Discovery Channel's ratings-winning survival contest "Naked and Afraid" thrown in — "Dating Naked" is one of a rash of upcoming reality-TV shows in which ordinary people shed their inhibitions and their clothes.

They include TLC's "Buying Naked," premiering Saturday, about a firm of real estate brokers serving a nudist community in Tampa, Florida, and Lifetime's "Born in the Wild," a fly-on-the-bush documentary focusing on pregnant women giving birth outdoors, currently in preproduction.

Meanwhile, WE tv is pushing the envelope further with its pilot for "Sex Box," an "educational" program in which real-life couples disappear into a soundproof box to do the dirty deed — then discuss their sexual hang-ups with a team of therapists.

"Yes, you can call it a trend," quips Troy DeVolld, a seasoned reality series producer in LA who wrote the book "Reality TV."

"The naked thing is the latest in a string of concepts being explored to keep the genre fresh.

"If something catches on, you always see people spinning the idea.

"All these TV executives are saying: '"Naked and Afraid" is so successful, why don't we do "Naked This" or "Naked That"?' The format has been proven to work."

But some critics remain unimpressed. "There's a dearth of ideas in reality TV," says Jennifer Pozner, a New York-based media commentator and author of the book "Reality Bites Back."

Christina Porcelli is looking for love on "Dating Naked."Photo: VH1

A sexy scene in "Dating Naked."Photo: VH!

"We've had a decade and a half of these shows and they are over-saturating the market with bottom-feeder premises that are incredibly cheap to produce.

"They're the lowest of the low. The producers can't shock people any more by flipping tables a la 'Real Housewives' and they've done all those 'women-can't-be-successful-without-a-husband,' 'surviving in the wild' and 'song and dance competition' shows.

"So the TV executives are saying: 'What can we do that we haven't done before? Oh, I know, let's do the same thing, but let's take everybody's clothes off!' "

Ask Porcelli why she appeared on "Dating Naked" and she maintains there is more to the show than just voyeurism. "It's actually heartfelt and much deeper than people imagine," says the Canarsie-raised writer and comedian, who now lives in Nashville, Tennessee.

"I love the concept because you are literally stripping down to nothing — your personality, pretty much. You really get to know the person you're with."

The 36-year-old looks back fondly on wacky on-camera activities, which include au naturel bird-watching and body painting on a canvas with her date. "I kept falling over and things kept hanging loose," she laughs. "But, after a while, I stopped caring."

Adds show host Amy Paffrath, who was the only one not required to go naked: "People caught off-guard by the title may think it's going to be one big orgy.

"But nudity doesn't have to be tied to sexuality. We're breaking down the barriers and changing the dialogue."

Her philosophy is shared by the team behind "Buying Naked," which follows realtor Jackie Youngblood as she persuades potential buyers to invest in a residential complex in Tampa where clothes are most definitely optional.

"Through this show, we're trying to teach people that nudity is natural, beautiful and about the inner person," Youngblood tells The Post.

In VH1's "Dating Naked," contestants get frisky with mud baths and zipline rides.Photo: VH1

Discovery Channel's survival show "Naked and Afraid" has impressive ratings and a cult following.Photo: VH1

Says TLC executive producer Mike Kane: "There will be viewers who come in for the curiosity value, but hopefully they'll stick around for the stories and see what unfolds.

"It's not a sexual show by any means. People are taking out the garbage in socks and sandals and nothing else!"

In line with cable network policy, the copious number of private body parts featured in "Dating Naked" and "Buying Naked" have been covered with a giant digitized fig leaf.

"We didn't want to blur everything, so we've also used clever blocking techniques like kitchen countertops, flowers and food," continues Kane. "But, no matter how hard you try, things slip through. We've watched and rewatched the cuts with a hawk's eye, but we've seen little things that have gotten loose here or slipped in there. We've had to go back to edit to fix it up."

Meanwhile, sociologist Tamara Mose Brown of Brooklyn College says the pixelation technique only serves to pique people's interest. "When you bleep out a word, everybody wants to know what the word is underneath that bleep," she points out. "The same thing is happening with these blurred body parts.

"It's basic titillation. These shows might be sold as exposing the audience to the idea that when we're naked and raw, a different discussion occurs.

"But the nakedness is adding a sexual undertone to the larger premise. Let's face it — it's all about ratings and profit."

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