Macaulay Culkin says his young children love Home Alone just as much as everyone else, but they still haven’t realized their dad is the kid on screen.
While celebrating the film’s 35th anniversary during his A Nostalgic Night with Macaulay Culkin tour stop at the Long Beach Terrace Theater on Nov. 22, the actor shared that his sons watch the movie “often,” yet haven’t made the connection that Kevin McCallister is their father at age 10.
Culkin explained that watching the movie with Dakota, 4, and Carson, 3, feels completely different now that he’s experiencing it through their eyes.
The boys “really love” Home Alone, he said, and they even get excited when they spot young Kevin in Disney+ clips.
Still, as Culkin put it, “They have no idea that I’m Kevin.”
Because they’re so little, he’s happy to let the mystery stay alive a bit longer. He admitted he wants “to keep up that illusion as long as possible.” His older son has started to get curious, though.
Culkin recalled putting Dakota to bed one night when the 4-year-old began asking about his siblings. So he showed him an old family photo of all seven Culkin children.
Dakota took one look and immediately said, “That kid looks like Kevin,” before moving right along. The actor said he breathed a little sigh of relief and let the moment pass.
Culkin added that Dakota sometimes goes a step further, confidently insisting he’s Kevin.
The actor laughed as he remembered a funny exchange, “Do you remember when you kicked burglars out?” his son asked. “And he’s like, ‘Yep.’ ‘You slide down the stairs?’ ‘I sure do.’ I was like, ‘You liar! That was me.’”
He also shared a sweet moment between them, recalling how he and Dakota both copied one of Kevin’s dance moves while watching the movie together.
For Culkin, those small experiences make revisiting the film even more meaningful. “Yeah, I do really love watching that movie with my boys," he said.
Culkin became a global icon playing the quick-thinking kid who outsmarts burglars in the 1990 holiday classic and its 1992 sequel, but for now, to his little ones, he’s just Dad.