Kieran Culkin recalls a director taking extreme measures to get him to method act during his first gig by pelting him with insults.
While appearing on the Dec. 23 episode of Jason Bateman, Sean Hayes and Will Arnett’s podcast Smartless, Culkin was asked by Arnett what his first professional acting experience was. Culkin shared that he was cast in a commercial at 6 years old but it wasn’t a pleasant experience. The Succession alum explained that while he couldn’t recall what exactly the ad was for, it involved “something to do with learning disabilities.”
“The concept was, I’m standing in front of a chalkboard with chalk in my hand and I don’t know how to solve the easy thing in front of me and the kids in the class are supposed to be calling me dummy and stupid and all that,” he said.
Culkin added that he has “a distinct memory” of the director calling “Action” and “going ‘Dummy. Idiot. Stupid.’”
“Even then, I’m thinking like, ‘You know, I get it. I’m 6. Like, ‘Stand here and look sad.’ I’m not fucking method, I’m 6. What’s wrong with you?,” said the Emmy-winning actor.
“Wow!,” exclaimed Bateman in shock. Arnett also expressed his disbelief, remarking, “Oh my God, oh my God.”
Back in June, Culkin admitted during a conversation with his A Real Pain co-star Jesse Einsenberg at the Tribeca Festival that he didn’t feel like he chose his acting career growing up.
He recalled having a chat with his manager Emily Gerson Saines where he had the realization. “Around the age of 20, I had a phone call with Emily, and she said, ‘Something, something, something, your career,’” said Culkin. “I remember having a panic and going, ‘I have a fucking career?’ I was just a 6-year-old, and I was doing this, and I never once chose to do this for myself. So I had that sort of crisis at like 19, 20, which I think is sort of normal.”
It wasn’t until filming the first season of Succession that Culkin realized he did want to focus on acting. “I came home and I was having a talk with my wife, and I was like, ‘I think I know what I want to do for a living. I want to be an actor,’” he explained. “I had been doing it for about 31 years at that point. I spent a good couple of decades trying to figure out what else to do and then landed on the thing I was doing.”