Keeping up with the Kardashians is finally due to end tomorrow night in the USA with fans finally discovering if they have successful kept up with the fame hungry family, or been left behind.
After an astonishing 14 years, 20 seasons and 273 episodes, the fly-on-the-wall documentary series will come to a close on Thursday night.
The series made previously unknown stars Kourtney, Kim, Khloe and Rob Kardashians household names around the world – as well as momager Kris Jenner, siblings Kylie and Kendall, and transgender icon Caitlyn Jenner.
But after all these years and episodes, it transpires that much of what fans have watched has been illusion and lies as a string of behind-the-scenes secrets reveal that stories may have been manipulated and even the homes of the stars have been faked.
As the series comes to an end, fans might now be left wondering exactly what they have watched is real, and what has been orchestrated for the cameras.
Here are some of the biggest secrets from the shows.
Fake homes
Aside from the human cast of Keeping up with the Kardashians, another key feature of the show is the lavish homes that the stars live in.
With Kim and Kylie reportedly billionaires, and the other cast members multi-millionaires, fans have been able to get access to their luxury houses via the cameras of the show.
But all is not as it seems – as although the interiors are real, the exteriors of the houses had to be changed to fake fronts for security reasons.
Kim confirmed this herself, when a fan asked on Twitter : "So is it true that y'all used a fake house for your reality show?"
She explained: "When we film inside, that's obviously our real home.
“My old home in Beverly Hills was really my home and I would get people showing up at all hours ringing my gate & had to call the police on several occasions."
Kim is in charge
The series was the brainchild of momager Kris Jenner, matriarch of the Kardashians family, and who decided to invite cameras into their extravagant lives for the entertainment of loyal TV fans.
But reports have suggested that Kim is the real driving force behind many of the ‘storylines’ that have featured on the show.
The second oldest sibling reportedly tipped off producers about the lives of their siblings in order to get cameras in the right place at the right time to capture some explosive action.
She told the Hollywood Reporter: “I think if you ask the crew, I probably produce the most because I know what my sisters might not be sharing.
“So I’ll tell them, 'Go over to Kourt’s house right now. Something is going on.'"
Kim even demands footage is erased if she doesn’t like it.
She said: "I mean, believe me, I’m not going to lie, there’s been times when I’ve walked away from the camera and I’ve got a big bump in my hair and I’m like, ‘Take that out, my hair looks like s***.’
“I’m too vain to leave really ugly, ugly angles in.”
There are very strict rules
Kris Jenner demands that the floors of her home be kept clean at all times – and as a result issues a blanket rule for all crew who enter her home.
The mum insists every wears show coverings while under her roof.
The rule only applies only to crew and was exposed during an expose by the New York Times in 2015.
A reporter who visited Kris’s house was stunned to see a “production assistant in surgical shoe coverings handed out microphones."
While, in contrast, the stars of the show are usually seen clip clopping around all the homes wearing designer shoes.
Crew’s silence is bought
As well as being issued with shoe coverings while working on the show, crew are also reportedly paid well to keep their mouths shut about what they see on and off camera, and are forced to sign strict Non-Disclosure Agreements.
A show source previously told OK! magazine: "E! knows what a tough job they have and how much they put up with."
Kris said she and her family mostly trust the crew not to sell them out, stating: "Unfortunately, there are some bad people out there who have not good intentions. And, you know, I obviously can’t control that.
"But to the best of my ability, we try to have people on our team who have our back, who we feel that we can really trust."
While Kim confirmed everyone signs NDAs, tweeting in 2019: “Btw NDA’S for all!!!! #KUWTK."
Filming takes half a day
Episodes of Keeping Up With The Kardashians might be a reasonably breezy 22-42 minutes, but the family spend up to 12 hours a day filming footage.
As well as the fly-on-the-wall nature of the show that sees the family going about their daily lives, there are also ‘confessional’ segments where they discuss their true feelings and suspicions about things that are subsequently shown on screen.
The New York Times previously reported: "at any given moment, there are one or two cameras on some combination of Kardashians and Jenners.
"They are there 10 to 12 hours a day each day that Keeping Up With the Kardashians is shooting, more if a plotline warrants it, which, between the regular season and the spinoffs, is basically always."
Filming is low tech
With so much footage required to make a simple half hour show, the cast and crew sometimes find themselves capturing material on their iPhones when the big camera’s aren’t around.
Former exec producer for the show, Jeff Jenkins, told the Hollywood Reporter: "There are days when there might be 30 crew people at a location to cover an event and there are days where there may be one person with an iPhone covering something incredibly intimate.”
While personalised cameras also became essential to keep the series in production during the Covid pandemic.
Kris took control during the global health crisis, insisting that one photographer and one tech person attend each house dressed head to toe in hazmat suits and utilising simpler equipment such as tripods and house lights to capture moments on camera.
Kris told Elle magazine: "It's less fly-on-the-wall, because we have to give them direction and they have to be more informative with us.
“But because this is the Kardashians and they're entertaining regardless, it will be a fun watch for people."
Hair and Make-up made days even longer
The Kardashian might be style icons to millions, but it takes a very long time for them to look so polished.
Kris has confessed she gets her hair and make-up professionally done before every single scene she features in.
Over the years, Kris is said to have got her glam routine down to one hour, but Kim takes longer.
Defending her two hour prep time per scene, Kim told Paper magazine: “There’s nothing we can do that’s not documented, so why not look your best and amazing?"
