Don’t get yourself murdered or banished — if you’re not finished with season 3 of “The Traitors” US, stop reading now because I’m going to spoil the season finale!

Let me get something really important out of the way. Alan Cumming, the actor known for everything from “Cabaret” to “Josie and the Pussycats” to “Romy and Michele’s High School Reunion,” does not own a massive castle in Scotland, contrary to what he claims as the host of the hit reality competition show “The Traitors.” (Cumming is, in fact, Scottish, but he really plays up his accent to play a fanciful character of sorts as the show’s host, and it’s clearly working; he won an Emmy for outstanding host for a reality or competition program in 2024, dethroning repeat winner RuPaul.) The castle that’s used as the setting of both “The Traitors US” and “The Traitors UK,” the latter of which is hosted by English broadcaster Claudia Winkleman, is actually Ardross Castle in Scotland. Again, Cumming does not own it, despite his whole schtick about how he’s allowing the players to stay in “his castle.”

As a funny aside, the contestants themselves don’t even actually spend the night in the castle. (In a 2023 interview with The Daily Beast, Cumming revealed, “Spoiler alert: None of us stayed in the castle. None of us. They all stayed in the airport hotel in the Inverness airport [laughs]. How glamorous—you come to Scotland, and you stay in the Inverness airport hotel. And I stayed in a little house in Inverness. But I had a room in the castle where I would get made up and dressed.”) So what of the castle itself? Well, Ardross Castle is located in the Scottish Highlands, and unsurprisingly, it’s got a lot of historical significance.

On Ardross Castle’s official website, it’s described as “a magnificent 19th-century castle in the Scottish Baronial style set within beautiful formal gardens and over 100 acres of parkland on the banks of the River Alness” that’s specifically located “just north of Inverness in the beautiful Scottish Highlands.” The website also explains the castle’s history, so here goes: at the end of the 18th century, it was turned into a hunting lodge by a duke, and that duke’s son sold it to a man named Alexander Matheson. Matheson is, ultimately, the person who left the biggest mark on Ardross Castle as we know it today.

Matheson, who made his money as a tea and opium merchant, bought the area that became Ardross Castle for a mere £90,000 (without accounting for inflation, that shakes out to $116,178.50 USD) and started work. Matheson had architect Alexander Ross create the expansive manse, adding features like gardens, a fountain, and ponds, many of which can be seen in establishing shots on both “The Traitors US” and “The Traitors UK.” The estate was sold by the Matheson family in 1898 to C. W. Dyson Perrins, a guy whose fortune came from several different sources (including porcelain and the unpronounceable condiment Worcester sauce (a popular brand of which is called Lea & Perrins, in fact). After even more “improvements” (again, more ornamental stuff like gardens and fountains), the estate belonged to Mr. and Mrs. Austin Mardon, and in 1983, the McTaggart family bought it.

Here’s something a little less dry and architecture-related: Ardross Castle is a wedding venue. You can’t stay there like you would at a hotel, but you can rent it for your nuptials with accomodations for up to 41 guests. This would be particularly sick if you wanted to have, say, a “Traitors”-themed wedding. 

All in all, Ardross Castle provides a spectacular setting for both the US and UK versions of “The Traitors,” and since the season three finale of “The Traitors US” just aired, it’s all fresh in everyone’s mind. So how did it all turn out at the Scottish castle that does not legally belong to Alan Cumming? (I would call him “Sir Alan Cumming” just to be funny, but Cumming returned his OBE in early 2023 due to his strongly held belief that the UK and its monarchy don’t do enough to support the LGBTQ+ community, so that would be factually incorrect and disrespectful to the man in question.) 

After a season that included some serious reality competition stars like “Boston” Rob Mariano and Carolyn Wiger from “Survivor” (both of whom were chosen to be Traitors), Britney Haynes and Danielle Reyes from “Big Brother,” and Bob the Drag Queen from “RuPaul’s Drag Race,” not a single so-called “gamer” emerged victorious. Instead, former “Bachelorette” Gabby Windey, royal and aristocrat Ivan Mountbatten, Dylan Efron (brother of Zac), and New Jersey Real Housewife Dolores Catania shared the prize pot as four Faithfuls, successfully ousting the last remaining traitor — Haynes — which prevented her from stealing the entire cash prize. All throughout the season, Faithfuls and Traitors alike traipsed throughout Ardross Castle as they plotted against each other to win the game … and unless there’s a serious change-up in future seasons, the Emmy-winning series will be able to pretend that the estate belongs to Cumming for years to come.

“The Traitors US” is streaming on Peacock now.