Featured Image Credit: Amy Sussman/Getty Images
Topics: Macaulay Culkin, Celebrity
Niamh Spence
Macaulay Culkin is arguably one of the most famous child stars in history, who shot to fame before he was 10 years old.
The actor, who has graced films including Home Alone, My Girl and Uncle Buck, is now 44 and a father of two. Now he's opened up on his relationship with his own dad Kit Culkin, who he no longer speaks to.
Macaulay spoke out to siblings Kate and Oliver Hudson as he made an appearance on their Sibling Revelry podcast, as he shared how his father's lack of relationship with him has made him determined to be different with his children.
Speaking on the podcast, Culkin shared: "One of my earliest memories of him [is thinking], ‘When I grow up, this is how I’m not gonna be with my kids'.
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"Now that I have kids of my own, it’s like … it kicks up some dust."
Culkin shares sons Dakota, 3, and Carson, 2 with fiancée Brenda Song.
He added: "I kinda go, I can’t believe he was like that. He had all these lovely kids. It’s crazy."
Culkin confirmed that he no longer has anything to do with his father, and hasn't spoken to him for 30 years. He also added that his siblings feel the same.
He explained: "Oh, he deserves it too. He’s a man who, he had seven kids, and now he has four grandkids. And none of them want anything to do with him."
Kit was previously a Broadway actor, although no longer in the spotlight. He shares six children with his ex partner Patricia Brentrup, including Macaulay.
The couple split in 1995 but are parents to Shane, 49, Dakota (who died aged 29 in 2008), Macaulay, 44, Kieran, 42, Quinn, 40, Christian, 38, and Rory, 35.
Kit also fathered a daughter with ex Adeena VanWagoner called Jennifer died in 2000 at age 29 from a drug overdose.
Calling his father 'narcissistic' and 'abusive', Culkin revealed he 'wanted nothing to do' with him during his parents’ custody battle in the 1990s.
During Macaulay's early acting career, Kit managed his son’s film roles and the income that came with it. Culkin learned he had a $50 million fortune only during his parents’ custody battle.
He shared in a 2021 interview: "My father would hide newspapers from me so I wouldn’t read the stuff about him or find out how much I was making.
"I had millions and millions of dollars in the bank and my mother couldn’t pay the rent because she was spending all of her money on lawyers. We were about to get evicted from our apartment."
Culkin also recalled one moment from his childhood where he refused to let his father visit him. He recalled: "I told my lawyer, I said, 'Yeah, I’m not doing that.'
"He said, ‘Well, you know, you’ll be in contempt of court’ and this and that. I go, ‘OK. Well, how about this? I dare the judge to put me in jail for not wanting to visit [my] abusive father. I actually, I’m gonna double down on that. I double-dare him to arrest the most famous kid in the world.'"
Kit has also spoken out about his relationship with Macaulay, when in an interview in 2016 to the Daily Mail he stated: "I don’t consider him a son anymore."
Culkin has also previously opened up about his and Kit’s estranged relationship in a podcast interview in 2018. He told the Marc Maron podcast: "He was a bad man. He was abusive, physically and mentally — I can show you all my scars if I wanted to. Everything he tried to do in life, I excelled at before I was 10 years old."