Reality-show secrets--revealed: we got insiders to tell everything you've been dying to know about television's hottest guilty-pleasure programs.(informer)

Q: What do producers look for in a reality-show candidate?

A: "We want people who can be themselves on TV and who are outgoing, confident, opinionated, and attractive," says Lacey Pemberton, casting director for The Bachelor and The Bachelorette. "We're not looking for supermodels, just people who we think a particular bachelor or bachelorette would be attracted to based on the compatibility questions we ask them. I also like contestants with humanitarian or creative jobs. I love to pick teachers, social workers, and artists."

Q: Do contestants get to veto anything from airing, say, really embarrassing behavior?

A: No, except for on Newlyweds, in which Jessica Simpson's dad, who is her manager, has final cut. Yet while contestants have no legal rights when it comes to editing (their contracts stipulate so), Average Joe executive producer Stuart Krasnow says, "If someone comes to us and begs us to cut a shot of them picking their nose or telling some terrible story about their mother, we'll absolutely consider cutting it."

Q: Did Paris Hilton get paid to do The Simple Life?

A: Yes, but according to her former publicist, Siri Garber, she was paid very little by Hollywood standards ("probably a couple hundred thousand") for the first show because Fox had no idea it would be such a runaway hit. Paris has admitted she's getting several times that to do The Simple Life 2.

Q: How do people get time off from work to do these shows without getting canned?