Home Alone director Chris Columbus has built a legacy by doing impressive work in his films that have proven to be classics. He shared with Demi Lovato about his own process for casting kids in onscreen ventures, and most importantly, finding the right parents.
Columbus appeared in Lovato’s Child Star documentary and spoke truthfully about his experience working with Macaulay Culkin after Home Alone and its success, which helped him in casting for his next big project, Harry Potter.
He recalled that Culkin got a lot of fame from Home Alone, which was not expected. Columbus shared that it was nothing like Harry Potter, where one knew about its potential success. He shared that he comes from a working class family and has seen many times when children suddenly become the breadwinners for their family.
Recalling the experience of casting for Harry Potter, the director revealed, “I had to close my eyes because that’s all I was hearing everywhere. You go down the street, you go to the pub, you go anywhere, and people ask, ‘Who are you going to cast? Who’s going to be Harry Potter, who’s going to be Harry Potter?'”
He added, “You take that information and bring it back to the actor and the actor’s parents: ‘This is going to be very serious.'” Columbus strove to ensure that the child actors he cast in iconic films knew what they were getting into, as stars such as Radcliffe were said to be under contract for multiple films at the same time.
He explained that this is the rest of the child actor’s life and it will be his “legacy” that he will have to learn to live with. According to The Guardian, he previously revealed that he was unaware of Culkin’s troubled home life that he was dealing with.
This experience helped him find children to work with in the film who had a good foundation at home. In the documentary, he told Lovato that he couldn’t send an actor to a film “into a very unstable home. It’s not worth it. Casting the parents was just as important as casting the kids.”
The Child Star documentary is available to stream on Hulu.
Also read: Colin Farrell reveals the unique trick he used to find his New York accent in HBO series The Penguins; ‘I’d say gefilte fish’
