Macaulay and Kieran Culkin were both child stars, but Kieran recognized Macaulay’s level of fame had a darkness to it.
HIGHLIGHTS
Kieran Culkin reflects on the dark side of Macaulay Culkin’s fame as a child star, expressing sympathy for his older brother’s experience.
Kieran and his siblings were affected by Macaulay’s fame, with their parents’ divorce and press intrusion causing embarrassment and emotional strain.
Kieran Culkin initially had mixed feelings about his own acting career, but found fulfillment with his role in Succession and has embraced acting once again.
Succession star Kieran Culkin has reflected on the dark side of his brother, Macaulay Culkin’s fame. The pair became household names after they starred together in the 1990 film, Home Alone.
Kieran spoke to Esquire about his childhood and growing up with a famous brother. “Even at that time, as a kid, I remember thinking, ‘That sucks for him,'” Kieran expressed about the attention his older brother, Macaulay received as a child. “He was little and having to try to accept that level of fame as reality.”
He added, “For me, I got to sort of experience it secondhand as a child. So to me, I always have known this is not something one would want to pursue. It’s not a very nice thing, fame. No anonymity, it’s terrible.”
In the following, we take a look at how Macaulay Culkin’s child star status affected Kieran Culkin and their whole family. We also reveal how Kieran Culkin dealt with his own level of fame as a child and what Macaulay has said about his stardom.
Macaulay Culkin’s Child Star Fame Affected Kieran Culkin’s Entire Family
Kieran and Macaulay Culkin’s father, Kit Culkin, was an aspiring actor and brother to Die Hard actress Bonnie Bedelia, and their mother was Patricia Brentrup. Kieran and Macaulay were just two of seven kids who grew up modestly.
During Kieran’s youth they lived in a railroad apartment in New York City “barely suitable for a couple.”
“It was just a hallway, and there were no separating doors, except for the bathroom, which didn’t have a lock.
They raised seven kids in that apartment—for years! They just kept bringing babies home to this little space,” the Emmy-winning actor explained.
After a particularly gruelling period of time, Kieran Culkin is ready for the next chapter in his life.
Kieran Culkin and his six siblings were all affected by Macaulay Culkin’s fame, especially as their parents’ 1995 divorce was highly publicized.
Kieran Culkin even wrote letters to the court as a teenager asking that the press be banned from entering the proceedings.
“I ask you please to spare my family any further embarrassment by letting the press in the courtroom. It has already been hard on us and I see no point to it.”
The Scott Pilgrim vs. the World star still refuses to talk to certain outlets, including Access Hollywood and The New York Post, after their treatment of the Culkin family.
“The newspaper doesn’t always give you the facts,” he explained. “Let me rephrase that. The New York Post doesn’t always give you the … facts.”
“He [Macaulay] would get harassed on the street,” Kieran Culkin confessed to The Hollywood Reporter about the downsides of his growing up with an internationally known brother.
“One time, a woman pulled off his hat and looked at him and said, ‘Yeah, it’s him! You’re not that cute.’ And then handed the hat back and walked away.”
“Neither Macaulay nor Kieran chose to act. It was, to a large degree, chosen for them,” long-time friend and manager Gerson Saines told Vanity Fair. “For Rory, on the other hand, it was always his choice.”
Kieran Culkin’s Child Star Career Wasn’t Exactly What He Wanted
Kieran Culkin had only a small part in both Home Alone and its 1992 sequel Home Alone 2: Lost in New York, before appearing in Father of The Bride and She’s All That. Kieran’s acting break wouldn’t come until 2002’s critically acclaimed Igby Goes Down.
He admits that seeing his older brother’s career caused him to rethink his own acting career, “I had this unhealthy relationship with what I did for a living,” Culkin told the People.
While Kieran Culkin shared his brother Macaulay Culkin’s passion for acting, he hated when the word “career” applied to his own work. “I really wanted to do it, but I didn’t want to be successful at it,” Kieran explained.
Kieran Culkin comes from a family known for its early stardom, or to better put it, early dislike for stardom.
After his breakthrough role in 2002’s Igby Goes Down, Kieran Culkin also walked away from fame and his career.
“I realized I’d been doing it for 14 years, and I never once made the decision ‘Hey, I want to be an actor,'” he told The Guardian.
“So I flipped out and – you can check my IMDb – I didn’t work for years. I didn’t know what I wanted to do with my life.”
It wasn’t until Kieran Culkin landed the role on HBO’s Succession, playing Roman Roy, that he felt comfortable with acting. “We were shooting last season when I came home one day and I said: ‘I think this is what I want to do.’
It took until I was 35, and I had been doing it for about 29 years for me to go, ‘Hey, I think I want to be an actor,'” he told The Guardian, adding that, also, “baby needs food.”
Since jumping back into acting, Kieran Culkin’s acting career has expanded further, with over 40 roles to his name.
Kieran also spoke to NPR about the effect Macaulay Culkin’s fame had on his childhood and his own opinions on fame. “Some people probably enjoy it, and they probably have been able to figure out life with it.
But I think for the most part, it comes to people and they go, ‘Oh, I’ve made a horrible mistake,’ and now they have to manage it. That’s the way I look at it,” the actor added.
“Any reasonable person would not, could not, look at fame and go, ‘I want that!’”
Kieran Culkin’s most recent acting role is in the film A Real Pain, starring alongside Jesse Eisenberg, which premiered at the Sundance Film Festival in January 2024.
How Macaulay Culkin Felt About His Fame
Macaulay Culkin reflected on his youth when he received his star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame. “I was 9 years old and so, like, you know, you kind of have to look at it from that perspective,” he said during the ceremony. “You have no idea what’s going on.”
When asked about his place in pop culture and how iconic Macaulay Culkin’s movies are, the Uncle Buck star admitted: “When it comes to my life and stuff like that, then I kind of can’t equate it to somebody else,” Macaulay said. “I can’t look left and right and find a lot of, like, peers when it comes to that kind of stuff.
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“It’s my life the way it normally is. But also, at the same time, I feel honored, and I think it’s super cool. You know, again, I get to be trivial.”
Macauley Culkin retired from child stardom at just 14 years old, although he’s dipped his toe back into the industry as an adult.
His recent roles include appearances on TV shows like American Horror Story and Righteous Gemstones and movies including Saved! and Party Monster.
Culkin admits he grew tired of acting and retired after Richie Rich. He gave up Hollywood to go to a private high school in Manhattan.
