Big Fat Gypsy Weddings

Big Fat Gypsy Weddings is a British documentary series produced by Firecracker Films for Channel 4, looking at the world of gypsies and Irish travellers in Britain today. First broadcast in February 2010 as a one-off called My Big Fat Gypsy Wedding, and part of the Cutting Edge series, a series of 5 episodes was commissioned and began in January 2011. A second series began airing in February 2012.

In North America, the show airs on TLC under the title My Big Fat Gypsy Wedding, with the original narration by Barbara Flynn replaced with new narration by Amy Raudenbush.



Reception
The show has been criticized mainly by the Irish Traveller & British Gypsy/Traveller communities for misrepresenting them. Jane Jackson, deputy chief executive of the Rural Media Company, a charity which publishes the Travellers' Times said: “ 	It's posing as a documentary, the voiceover is saying we're going to let you into the secrets of the traveller community – and it [sic] just not true. It might be true of the particular families in front of the camera, but it's not generally true. They're made to look totally feckless, not really to be taken seriously as an ethnic group. ”

Jes Wilkins, the executive producer said that the vast majority of the participants in the show are happy with their on-screen portrayal. Wilkins said: “ 	The problem has been with the media response, particularly from the tabloid press. It's become one of the big cultural phenomena of this part of the year and people are looking for something to write about it, something provocative. Some [sic] these articles have upset our contributors which has been disappointing. ”

Others from the Traveller and Gypsy communities question the show's title. Billy Welch, a spokesman for Romani Gypsies said: “ 	While Channel 4 should be praised for at least differentiating between Irish Travellers and Romani Gypsies, the first three episodes have in fact focused exclusively on Irish Travellers and their traditions: They called the show Big Fat Gypsy Wedding and you've yet to see a Romani Gypsy in it. ”

During the episode No Place Like Home, Big Fat Gypsy Weddings had 4 of the top 10 trending topics worldwide on social networking website Twitter.

Television producer Simon Cowell expressed interest in making a US version of the show in February 2011. In June 2011, TLC rebroadcast the show and was filming a U.S. version of the show.

Ratings
Big Fat Gypsy Weddings opened in 2011. The second episode got 7.4m viewers at its peak, Channel 4's highest ratings since Big Brother in 2008. The consolidated figures for the series' second episode were 8.7 million, making it Channel 4's eighth highest-rating programme ever. The final episode was watched by 6.5 million viewers, easily beating the 2011 BRIT Awards which had an average viewership of 4.8 million.

Series
There are two series of the show, followed by three special episodes: My Big Fat Gypsy Wedding, Big Fat Royal Gypsy Weddings, and My Big Fat Gypsy Christmas. Channel 4 confirmed a third series to air in winter 2012 or early 2013.