The producer of America's biggest reality television hit today admitted some of its scenes were faked.

Mark Burnett, the producer of Survivor, said body doubles had been used as stand-ins to shoot some of the scenes on the show, of which ITV is to make a British version.

But the creator of the hit show, which spawned a sequel which ended last week and is now to take to American screens for a third time, claimed there was nothing wrong with the practice.

'I couldn't care less - I'm making great television,' he said. Survivor was shot on a tiny tropical island in Malaysia with 16 contestants competing against themselves, challenges set by producers and nature to win a $1 million prize.

It was on Borneo that the body doubles for the 16 contestants, who became household names in the US, were used.

They were used in panoramic shots of the island to avoid the camera crews who followed each Survivor appearing in the shot.

And a swimming race was restaged using the stand-ins so that a helicopter could record the contest from the air without the camera crews in the way.

A spokesman for the maker of the hit series, broadcaster CBS, played down the admission.

'What this means is that those people chasing UFOs and looking for Elvis will probably gravitate back to their Survivor conspiracy theories this week,' he said.

The admission came after months of rumour, speculation and conspiracy theories on the internet.

And it comes as one contestant, Stacey Stillman, sues CBS, claiming her ousting from the show was rigged.

The 28-year-old lawyer was voted out by the 'tribal council' - the other contestants - but claims she learned from another Survivor that the producers had suggested to him and another contestant it would be a good idea to boot her off.

She claims Mr Burnett had manipulated the vote, breaking rules put in place by the US government 50 years ago to prevent television contests being rigged, after the quiz show scandal that was portrayed in the 1994 film Quiz Show.