20 facts you might not know about Home Alone

John Hughes was one of the premier filmmakers and screenwriters of the ‘80s. He had his hand in films like “Pretty in Pink,” “The Breakfast Club,” and more. Hughes was headed on vacation and doing a checklist when he was struck by the idea, “What if I accidentally left my son at home?” This sparked the idea for the movie.

Originally, Warner Bros. was producing “Home Alone.” However, Hughes had concerns. Warner Bros. was being strict about a limited budget, and Hughes wasn’t sure he could make it work. As such, he secretly had the script sent to 20th Century Fox basically saying that if things fell through at Warner Bros. they could have it. Indeed, Warner would shut down production because of the rising cost projections, and the movie quickly moved to Fox.

Chris Columbus first made a splash in Hollywood with the script for “Gremlins.” He was working on another Christmas project when Hughes started looking for a director for “Home Alone.” That was “National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation.” However, Columbus left that movie before he even began shooting because he found Chevy Chase impossible to deal with (what a shocker). Hughes offered Columbus a choice of scripts, and he went with “Home Alone.”

Hughes had worked with Culkin on “Uncle Buck,” and suggested him for the role of Kevin McCallister right away. Columbus, though, wanted to do his due diligence. He met with 200 child actors for the role, and then eventually did meet with Culkin. Quickly he realized that Culkin was indeed right for the movie, and he probably could have saved himself quite a bit of work.

John Mulaney is a standup superstar now, but he had to wait for adulthood to attain fame. Things could have been different, though. Mulaney has said that he was asked to audition for the role of Kevin as a kid, but his parents would not allow him to do it.

The McCallister boys apparently liked to have kids. Peter and Uncle Frank and their respective wives have several kids between them. That meant a lot of child actors were needed. As such, it only made sense for Columbus to through Kieran Culkin a role in “Home Alone.” Kieran plays Fuller, Kevin’s cousin.

Apparently, Columbus was on a bit of a Martin Scorsese kick or something. He offered the role of Harry, one of the two robbers, to Robert De Niro, who turned it down. Pesci would end up taking the role. Also, turning the role of Harry down? That would be Jon Lovitz, a very different type for that part.

Pesci didn’t just make a memorable turn in a future Christmas favorite in 1990. It was also the year he played Tommy in “Goodfellas.” He would go on to win Best Supporting Actor for his work in that movie.

Stern, who had more traditional comedic chops than Pesci, was cast as the more talkative, goofier Marv. However, that almost didn’t happen. Stern was indeed signed on, but then the schedule was extended by two weeks. The actor was not happy with that and decided to leave the film. Actor Daniel Roebuck was even cast in his place. Columbus didn’t think that Roebuck and Pesci had chemistry, though, so he did what he had to do to get Stern back.

The role of the Santa Claus impersonator in the movie is not a big one, and in the end, it went to an actor named Kenneth Hudson Campbell. Another actor tried to get that role, but Columbus was not impressed with his audition. That actor? None other than Chris Farley.

We mentioned “Uncle Buck” earlier, a movie that starred Candy as the titular character. He had a history with Hughes and agreed to do his brief role as polka musician Gus Polinski as a solid for him. Candy only worked one day, and he took a minimum salary of $414 for the part. As further compensation, Candy was the only one who was allowed to divert from the script. Columbus has said that Candy improvised basically all his dialogue.

Uncle Frank’s part was written specifically for Kelsey Grammer. This was pre-“Frasier,” but he was already going strong on “Cheers” at the time. Perhaps that’s why Grammer ended up being unavailable for the role that was designed for him. Instead, actor Gerry Bamman got his defining role as Uncle Frank.

You know the line: “Buzz’s girlfriend. Woof.” This is what Kevin says when he looks at the photo Buzz has of his paramour. Columbus thought that would be mean to do to an actual girl, so he decided to dress a boy up in drag thinking that would be more palatable. Art director Dan Webster’s son stepped into the role.

Hughes loved Winnetka, Illinois, a suburb of Chicago. It’s where “Home Alone” was shot, and the house from the film was a real house there (though some of the interiors were shot on a sound stage). On top of that, Hughes shot “The Breakfast Club,” “Ferris Bueller’s Day Off,” “Uncle Buck,” and even more of his films in Winnetka as well.

“Angels with Filthy Souls” is not a real movie, though its title is a riff on the real “Angels with Dirty Faces.” As such, they had to shoot the footage of that film for the movie. Using real props from the era and using black-and-white negative film, “Angels with Filthy Souls” was shot in a day.

Both Pesci and Stern had trouble not swearing while filming the movie. Obviously, a PG family film could not have too much vulgarity, especially with a kid like Culkin on set. Pesci developed his gibberish mumbling that feels like swearing but isn’t as a result. Stern, meanwhile, accidentally dropped a “sh*t” during one scene that quietly made the final cut.

Kevin is pretty brutal to the burglars, even if they are criminals. The damage he deals out would have killed Harry and Marv many times over in real life. It seemed to feel that way on set as well. Columbus has said that watching the stunt guys do their stunts wasn’t funny at all, and mostly they just hoped the stunt people weren’t hurt too badly. Stern did do one stunt himself, though, when a real tarantula was put on his face. He was worried about doing the scream at first until he was informed that tarantulas don’t have ears.

“Home Alone” cost $18 million, a prize that Warner Bros. wouldn’t shell out, mind you. That investment paid off big time for Fox. The movie made a staggering $476.7 million worldwide. To put that into perspective for the era, that made it the third-highest-grossing movie ever at that time. It was the highest-grossing live-action comedy ever all the way until 2011 as well, when “The Hangover II” took over that spot.

“Home Alone” was a blockbuster, but it didn’t necessarily seem like it had Oscar potential. Golden Globes? Sure. Kids’ Choice Awards? You bet. However, it did get two Academy Award nominations. One was for John Williams’ score, and one was for the original song “Somewhere in My Memory” by Williams and Leslie Bricusse.

Naturally, a movie as big as “Home Alone” was going to spawn sequels. Culkin returned for “Home Alone 2: Lost in New York,” where Kevin is left by his parents again, this time ending up in the Big Apple. This led to “Home Alone 3,” although this time Culkin was too old for the film so a new kid was brought on. Since then, there have been three more “Home Alone” movies, each starring a new kid. The most recent is “Home Sweet Home Alone,” which came out on Disney+ and features Rob Delaney and Ellie Kemper as the bumbling burglars.