‘Home Alone’ actor Kieran Culkin says he had no idea what it was about

Before A Real Pain, Succession, and even Father of the Bride, a young Kieran Culkin was cast in his very first role in the blockbuster Home Alone. He was so young, in fact, that he says he didn’t even understand what was going on in the beloved caper.

“I had no idea what that movie was about when I saw it, and I was in it,” the actor said in an interview published Tuesday in the Los Angeles Times. “I was at the premiere, and I was dying laughing. It was the funniest thing I had ever seen. I had no idea what the movie was about.”

When the movie was released in November 1990, Culkin had just turned eight so he’s to be forgiven. Eight is the same age as the movie’s protagonist, Kevin McCallister (portrayed by Kieran’s older brother Macaulay Culkin), whose parents accidentally leave him behind when they go on a trip for the holidays. Kevin later discovers that thieves Marv (Daniel Stern) and Harry (Joe Pesci) have set their sights on his house, and he hilariously defends it by setting off traps all over the gorgeous abode.

Kiernan’s small but memorable role was that of Fuller, one of Kevin’s younger cousins who has a habit of wetting the bed. Kevin complains about being forced to bunk with him because of this, and it’s part of what drives him to argue with his mother (Catherine O’Hara). Banished to the attic, he gets left behind.

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None of this was knowledge that the younger Culkin needed to play his part.

“‘Drink this Coke, wear the glasses, say the thing that you memorized, look cute and go home,'” Culkin said he was told.

The actor who portrayed Kevin’s pain-in-the-butt older brother, Buzz, apparently acted the part off-screen too.

“Devin Ratray, the guy who plays Buzz, lied to me and told me the movie was all about him,” Culkin said. “And I believed him. And then when I saw it, the movie’s cracking me up, and I go, ‘Mac was on set all the time. That makes sense the movie would be about him.'”

More than three decades later, Culkin is generating Oscar buzz for his turn in A Real Pain, in which he and Jesse Eisenberg play Jewish cousins on a Holocaust memorial tour through Poland.