Hollywood: home to the stars of the silver screen, the rich and famous, the beautiful, the fake, and also some of the most scandalous love affairs of all time. It almost wouldn't be Hollywood without tales of the casting couch and rumours off screen chemistry filling the magical air - so it's no surprise that being married seems to have little effect when it comes to co-stars getting cozy once the cameras stop rolling.
Many A-list stars including Jessica Biel and Jennifer Aniston have even visited their other-halves on set when whispers of closeness with their leading ladies had reached their ears, but some got there too late.
It's not hard to see how affairs can happen between actors - in many ways it's the same setting as an office romance only with the glitz and glam of Hollywood. Both people have a lot in common from the start: the same career, ambitions and motivations, coupled with playing intense and sometimes sexual roles - it's like a volcano waiting to explode! Any issues in our current relationships can take a backseat when we are at work, we can forget our personal stresses and focus on the task at hand; but all to often the convenient shoulder to cry on can be that of a colleague, and the rest is history.
And in Hollywood - it really is. We know all the intimate details of messy break-ups and secret affairs once they are outed to the media, and some alleged affairs such as Marilyn Monroe and John F Kennedy, are as famous as the town itself.
While some on-set affairs prove to be nothing more than a quick fling, some couples have gone the distance after meeting at work, while they were still married, or their lover was not single. So, as Sunday saw the 84th Academy Awards take place in tinsel town, IllicitEncounters.com take a look at some alleged and not so alleged steamy affairs that rocked the city of Angels.
Meg Ryan and Russell Crowe
Meg Ryan was painted as a scarlet woman by the media when news of an affair with her 'Proof of Life' co-star Russell Crowe become public in 2000. Meg was married to fellow actor Dennis Quaid at the time who she later reveal had cheated on her repeatedly throughout their marriage - it was only Meg however who came across negatively in the press. She later commented on her marriage: "It's very difficult to be a career person and have a relationship. I didn't succeed at doing it at all. It's incredibly hard." And of Russell she said: "He didn't talk and I'll always be grateful to him for that. But I did not leave my marriage for him. I left because it was not working."
Julia Roberts and Dan Moder
At the time of their meeting on the set of 'The Mexican' in 2000, cameraman Danny Moder was married to make-up artist Vera Steinberg; they had been married for five years. Moder had indicated that marital problems were well in existence prior to meeting Roberts. Following this admission, the pair's affair began. Julia made no secret of her attraction to Moder - she even called the home of her lover, and when his wife Vera answered she joked that she thought her husband was ' kind of cute' and 'could she borrow him?' Vera was decidedly fuming and a bitter love triangle played out in public, which ended in Moder and Steinberg divorcing in 2002, and Julia getting her man on their July 4th wedding, the same year.
Angela Jolie and Brad Pitt
Possibly the most famous and talked about relationship of the movie world started in 2005 and when Jolie and Pitt starred as a married couple in 'Mr and Mrs Smith'. It was a case of life imitating art when to everyone's surprise Brad left his wife of five years and wholesome American sweetheart Jennifer Aniston, for the strikingly beautiful and edgy Angelina Jolie. To this day, both Pitt and Jolie deny ever having an affair and maintain that nothing happened until after Pitt and Aniston had parted, however Aniston has said that what Angela did was "not cool," indicating that foul play had occurred, where as Jolie explained in 2005: "To be intimate with a married man, when my own father cheated on my mother, is not something I could forgive. I could not look at myself in the morning if I did that. I wouldn't be attracted to a man who would cheat on his wife." It seems we will never know the whole truth about this union, but Pitt and Jolie's relationship has gone from strength to strength as they raise their tribe of children, while Aniston remains friends with Pitt and is now engaged to her actor boyfriend, Justin Theroux.
Amber Heard and Johnny Depp
After nearly 14 years of dating, Johnny Depp called time on his relationship with the beautiful French actress and singer Vanessa Paradis in June 2012, amid rumours that he had grown close to his co-star Amber Heard from 'The Rum Diaries' in 2011. Similar to the Pitt - Jolie 'situation' no one has stated foul play, although Amber and Johnny started dating publicly in the summer of 2012. The uber cool couple revealed their engagement this January while Paradis publicly "wished him happiness," confirming there is no drama or ill feelings between Depp and his former partner and mother of their two children Lily-Rose and John 'Jack'.
'And they all lived happily ever after'