Kieran Culkin was born in New York City, New York. His older brother Macaulay Culkin is famous for playing Kevin McCallister in the Home Alone films. Kieran also appeared in both films that starred his brother as Kevin’s cousin Fuller. That role was his feature film debut at seven years old.

He had other roles as a child actor in Father of the Bride (1991) and Only the Lonely (1991). Later he went on to appear in Music of the Heart (1999) and The Cider House Rules (1999). His breakout role in Igby Goes Down (2002) earned him a Golden Globe nomination, and he made his Broadway debut as Dennis Ziegler, a drug dealer, in This Is Our Youth. Before he returned to the cultural conversation in HBO’s Succession as Roman Roy, brother to Jeremy Strong’s Kendall Roy and Sarah Snook’s Shiv Roy, Culkin appeared in Kenneth Lonergan’s You Can Count on Me (2000) and in M. Night Shyamalan’s Signs (2002).

Succession Season 4 brought Culkin an Emmy Award. His latest project, Jesse Eisenberg’s A Real Pain (2024) sees Culkin play the free-spirited Benji to Eisenberg’s more buttoned-up David. The pair play cousins who take a trip to Poland to pay tribute to their late grandmother. Culkin won a Golden Globe for the role, and he is Oscar-nominated for the Best Supporting Actor category. Culkin is married to Jazz Charton, and they have two children. He was once romantically linked to Emma Stone.