David Duchovny's Trial by Fire on The X-Files Set

When filming “Fire,” the “light My fire” episode of “The X-Files,” David Duchovny experienced a veritable trial by fire that resulted in a permanent scar. As a matter of fact, the 1993 southern california wildfires were the trigger for the events in the episode, which only makes the mentioned event more ironic.

Being the nineties, creating fire using a computer was a very complicated and untimely impossible process; consequently, the scenes where the characters were only inches away from fire were shot using real fire.

At one of the scenes in question, David Duchovny managed to burn the outside of his left hand; the resulting scar can be seen in the episode where Zukino plays with fire and Mulder stops him, then gets the fire-extinguisher and spray it all over the office.

What seems surprising, however, is how gracefully the rough situation was handled by Duchovny. To be more exact, he not only refused to reshoot the episode, but also demanded that the editor used the episode where he was burned.

According to the sources, he told Chris Carter, the creator of the show, that “The one he wants is the one where I burn myself. It’s real, it’s what’s supposed to happen.” The specified example shows that even in the environment, where a variety of supernatural occurrences are a common thing, an actor can find themselves in an unpleasant and unexpected situation.