I hope I'm remembered as the king of the world, the noble man who united all the nations of the earth. But that probably won't happen.
— Macaulay Culkin
I am a collection of thoughts and memories and likes and dislikes. I am the things that have happened to me and the sum of everything I've ever done. I am the clothes I wear on my back. I am every place and every person and every object I have ever come across. I am a bag of bones stuck to a very large rock spinning a thousand miles an hour.
It took me ten minutes to write this very sentence. I'm no writer. This is not my calling.
All the child-star cliches, I've tried very hard to avoid them all.
As a senior in high school, you figure out what you want to do with your life. I asked myself if I wanted to get back into acting and thought: 'Yes, but under my own terms and nothing like it was before.'
After seeing 'Big,' I wanted an elevator that opened directly into my apartment, just like Tom Hanks did.
I lead a simple life. I feed the fish. I walk the dogs. I cook dinner. Occasionally I take a meeting.
I've always said that acting found me. I didn't really find it.
I don't even know how to define myself. I'm a person who writes. It's something I enjoy, and hopefully people enjoy it as well.
It's like, I don't think you understand, Michael Jackson's bedroom is two stories and it has, like, three bathrooms and this and that. So, when I slept in his bedroom, yes, but you understand the whole scenario.
I remember sitting one time doing 100 interviews in a day, and they're all television interviews and they're kind of - and you just sit there and they bring these people in and out, and in out.
People do bad things in their lives. And those sort of things are forgivable. That's half the point of having confession in church - you need to be able to fess up to what you've done.
It's about finding unique, one-of-a-kind films that I would want to see myself. I think 'Party Monster' is one of those.
Most of the offers I get from Hollywood are for teen comedies. My manager thinks I'm crazy for turning down all that money, but I'm very picky.
I had all the fame anyone could want, and I ran away from it.
They put it on the page because it sounded good or it looked good or they read it in a book somewhere that this is how you structure a script or something, and they just don't get it. It's surprising.
I write a good amount. I've been gathering up a backlog of stuff and maybe I'll do something with it someday, but I don't want to talk about it just yet because that would jinx it.
If an alien race lands on the planet Earth tomorrow and asks me to prove I'm really here, what do I do? What do I give them? What do I tell them? What do I show them? I can't sing or dance. I can't paint. I've never built anything, and I've never contributed anything significant to the human race.
Much like anyone with too much time on his or her hands, I feel as though I am the most important person on earth and everything I do is relevant. I say the most charming and inspired things when no one is around.
I felt like I had two fathers. I had my real father and the father in my head.
It drives me crazy when your parents try to read your mind. It's even worse when they try to read your mail.
If I find cool, open-minded people, want to do unique one-of-a-kind kind of project, I'll do it as long as I can.
There's more to me, you know? I'm not Macaulay Culkin, 'Home Alone' kid. I'm Macaulay Culkin... actor.
I've led a very isolated existence since I was 6 years old. It's kind of been me and my mind.
I get carded for soda, you know, when I go to the supermarket. I mean, they card me for everything. You know, I can't even get through a hand of black jack without getting carded, like, five times.
A lot of people meet me and they're like, 'Why aren't you crazy?'
Gosh, I couldn't even talk right until I was about 6 years old or something like that.
I have no control over people's perceptions of me at all and that's one of the things I decided very early on is that I can't control the way other people think of me. All I can do, especially when it comes to my career is go out there and do cool unique kinds of things.
I'm not expecting the American literary community to welcome me with open arms. To them I'm just some schmuck kid who wrote some book.
People still recognize me all the time on the street. The first thing they say when they stop me is, 'Where have you been?' The second comment they make is always, 'Oh, you've grown up.'
My father was overbearing. Very controlling. He was always the way he is, even before my success. He was not always a good person. He'd play mind games to make sure I knew my place. I don't see him, which is unfortunate. But I don't have any desire to see him. I vaguely know where he is, and I don't want to know.
I'm not one of those actors who needs the media spotlight all the time to feel gratified. I'm happy to do one project a year and take the rest of the year off as long as that project is special.
It's a place where I could do something on a weekly basis and see if I like it.
I went to high school, which was a good thing because I hadn't interacted with many people my age, and I didn't really have friends. I had a million acquaintances and no friends.
I do have a family, and I do have friends, and so-called friends, and acquaintances, and many other people I see only around Christmas time. Maybe they could vouch for me. Maybe they could testify to my existence and save a part of me that thinks I'm no better than a bag of potato chips.
Sometimes I feel like I have a dozen different people inside of me. I've always been that way, and I've always written stuff down.
Oh wow, you know what's wrong with all these families on TV? All these kids say stuff no kid would say. Stuff grown-ups want them to say. Man, I'd make a really realistic family. Where kids get spankings. On TV parents say, 'Oh, you shouldn't do that ever again. Now you can have ice cream.' Forget it.
I hope people don't think I'm crazy, because I'm not.
I'd made enough money by the time I was 12 to never have to work again.
I'm not one of those people who needs that gratification of doing, like, 10 films a year.
Math is one of my favorite subjects.
I enjoy my life. I think I have a very good life. And I think I'm very satisfied with the direction of my career and just my lifestyle and everything like that. So I wouldn't change a single thing.
I can go to any restaurant without a reservation, but while I'm there, everyone's gonna be staring.
I try not to label myself anything, really, but you know, I'm definitely an indoorsy person, and I definitely kind of just try to, you know, stay away from life in the public eye, at least.
I have a lot of growing up to do, or a lot of growing down. I think that's probably more appropriate.
The funny thing is, I'm not really a big reader, not a big fan of books in the first place.
I'd made enough made money by the time I was 12 to never work again, so it's not about a big pay check with me.
Acting found me. I thought maybe I should try to find it again. We'll see.
I'm the most out-of-work actor I know. In the last two years I've basically taken meetings for a living.
I'm doing naughty things, I'm drinking too much, I'm going to clubs. It really didn't matter to me, other than the fact that some parents wouldn't let their kids hang out with me.
