House from Big Fish set goes up in flames after lightning strike

A house that featured in Tim Burton’s 2003 fantasy film Big Fish has burnt down after it was struck by lightning.

The movie’s fictional “Town of Spectre”, which has become a tourist attraction on Jackson Lake Island in Alabama, is currently inhabited by goats.

“We lost a house in the Town of Spectre tonight after a lightning strike,” a Facebook post from the private island stated on Monday (3 June). “All the goats were safely under the church. Thank you Millbrook Fire Department.”

The island was open to visitors on Tuesday (4 June). “It’s the morning after losing one of our houses in Spectre to fire,” a second post read. “The remainder of the town is fine, and we will be open every day as usual.”

In the film, Ewan McGregor’s Edward Bloom sets out on a journey looking for a better life, and accidentally discovers the strange and beautiful town deep in a haunted forest.

The town was thought up by production designer Dennis Gassner, and custom built for the film. It includes a cluster of houses, a church and an overhead wire with shoes dangling from it.

Big Fish, based on the 1998 novel of the same name by Daniel Wallace, co-stars Billy Crudup, Jessica Lange, Helena Bonham Carter, Marion Cotillard, and Danny DeVito.

It received positive reviews and grossed $122.9m against a $70m budget, as well as garnering four Golden Globe nominations, seven Bafta nods and one Oscar nomination for Danny Elfman’s original score.

The movie was initially going to be directed by Steven Spielberg, but the filmmaker dropped out to focus on Bafta winner Catch Me if You Can.

Speaking to GQ about making the film, McGregor said the shoot was fun because he “got to make fantastical things happen”.

“I got to work with elephants in a circus,” he said. “It was just an amazing experience to do.”

Of working with Burton, he added: “I’ve always hoped that might happen again, and I still hope so. I love his imagination.”

He said Burton’s set brought “a sense of play” that felt “so free”, with McGregor comparing the director to a “mad professor”.

The film tells the story of a frustrated son who tries to separate fact from fiction in his dying father’s life.

“It’s a film that a lot of men like because it’s so much about a father and a son,” McGregor said. “Some people come up to speak to me thinking about their dads and sometimes people are talking about their sons. It seems to hit a chord, and that’s really nice when that happens.”