Home Alone's Macaulay Culkin: From child star to family life with Brenda Song, net worth and drug arrest

There are some familiar faces who are sure to crop up on your TV every Christmas and Macaulay Culkin is one of the most recognisable. He is best known for playing Kevin McCallister in the hit festive films Home Alone and Home Alone 2: Lost in New York.

He shot to fame as a child star, as he was just ten years old in Home Alone, and has remained in the spotlight ever since. For his performance, Macaulay was nominated for a Golden Globe Award and won an American Comedy Award and a Young Artist Award.

After roles in Richie Rich, My Girl and Uncle Buck, Macaulay retired from acting aged 14 and wanting a "normal life" he went to a private high school in Manhattan. The star returned to acting in 2000, aged 20, and his other roles included starring in American Horror Story and Sex and Breakfast.

The child star also married his first wife, Rachel Miner in 1998 when they were both 18. They went on to separate in 2000 and divorce in 2002. For the latest TV & Showbiz news, sign up to our newsletter.

He also dated Family Guy star Mila Kunis, who is now married to Ashton Kutcher, before meeting Brenda Song in 2017 on the set of Changeland. The pair had their first child Dakota in April 2021, who was named after Macaulay's late sister Dakota, who tragically passed away in a car accident in 2008.

In January 2022 the pair became engaged and in March 2023 Macaulay's famous brother Kieran Culkin, who is known for starring in Succession, confirmed that Brenda and Macaulay had a second child. It has been reported that Macaulay is worth $18 million, as reported by Parade.

He revealed in a 2018 interview with Ellen DeGeneres that he never realised he was wealthy until he was an adult because he didn't have access to his finances until he turned 18—four years after he "retired." "I didn't see it until I turned 18, I call it the 'Slip of Paper' meeting, where they pretty much put a number on a piece of paper and slide it across the table and then—boom! There you go," he said.

"So I felt like some kid worked really, really hard, and I inherited all of his money pretty much. I had kind of no real sense, but at the same time, it allows me to treat everything like a hobby really. I do nothing for my dinner nowadays, so I can do all kinds of projects."

Now 44, Macaulay hit the headlines during his early fame for "divorcing" his parents. He explained to Esquire: "I legally took my parents’ names off of my trust fund and found an executor, someone who would look over my finances, just in case anyone wanted to stick their f*****g pinkie in the pie. But the next thing you know, the story was that I divorced my parents.

"I just thought I was doing it cleanly - taking my father’s name off, taking my mom’s name off, so my opinion is unbiased. And when I did that, the whole thing kinda ended a lot faster."

He went on: "Look, I mean, it sucks. But, it coulda been worse, you know? I wasn’t working in a coal mine. I wasn’t a child soldier. My father was not sexually abusing me. ‘Certain f***ed up things happened, but f****d up things happen to kids all the time and they don’t come out the other end. I’ve got something to show for it, man. I mean, look at me: I got money, I got fame, I got a beautiful girlfriend and a beautiful house and beautiful animals."

In 2004 Macaulay was arrested in Oklahoma City for the possession of 17.3 grams of marijuana and two controlled substances, 16.5 milligrams of alprazolam and 32 milligrams of clonazepam, for which he was briefly jailed and then released on $4,000 bail. Talking to The Guardian in 2016, Macaulay said he was not addicted to drugs, he said: "I was not pounding six grand of heroin every month or whatever. The thing that bugged me was tabloids wrapping it all in this weird guise of concern. No, you’re trying to shift papers."

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